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INTERNATIONAL  EDUCATION  SERIES 


THE  EDUCATION  OF  THE 
GREEK  PEOPLE 

AND  ITS  INFLUENCE  ON  CIVILIZATION 


BY 

THOMAS  DAVIDSON 


NEW    YORK 

D.    APPLETON    AND    COMPANY 

1894 


A  0 


COPTRIGHT,   18^, 

By  D.  APPLETON  AND  COMPANY. 


ElJECTROTYPED  AND  PRINTED 
AT  THE   APPLETON  I*RESS,  U.  S.  A, 


EDITOE'S  PEEFACE. 


The  history  of  education  is  best  studied  when 
taken  in  that  large  sense  in  which  nations  are  said  to 
be  teachers,  each  people  bringing  its  ethnical  contri- 
bution to  the  civilization  of  the  human  race.  In  so 
far  as  a  nation  invents  ethical  means  to  overcome  the 
obstacles  that  it  finds  to  its  free  development,  it  offers 
education  to  other  nations  by  furnishing  an  object  les- 
son in  solving  the  problem  of  life.  Such  lessons  have 
been  furnished  by  the  English  nation  in  achieving 
what  is  known  as  local  self-government,  inventing  de- 
vices by  which  the  extreme  of  individualism  is  har- 
monized with  the  centralized  interest  of  the  whole 
people  J;' by  the  German  nation  a  quite  different  lesson, 
through  the  perfection  of  its  system  of  endowing  a 
centralized  government  with  the  power  of  securing  in 
its  service  those  of  its  citizens  possessed  of  the  most 
powerful  wills  and  wide-seeing  intellects;  by  the 
French  nation  another  lesson,  in  training  a  whole 
people  in  the  art  of  tasteful  arrangement  of  all  their 
productions,  whether  material  or  spiritual,  so  as  to  re- 
enforce  all  things  useful  by  the  addition  of  the  beau- 
tiful.   ~ 

But  there  are  three  nations  of  ancient  time  that 
stand  to  modern  civilization  in  the  relation  of  teachers 


Vi  EDITOR'S  PREFACE. 

in  an  eminent  sense  of  the  term,  and  these  are^iceece, 
Rome,  and  Judea.  The  nations  of  Europe  and  Amer- 
ica of  to-day  recognize  this  debt  to  Judea  by  RptHng 
apart  a  learned  profession — the  highest  and  most 
sacred  of  all  professions,  the  clergy — to  master  the 
divine  message  revealed  through  the  highly  endowed 
spiritual  sense  of  the  Hebrews,  and  in  turn  to  make 
the  whole  people,  high  and  low,  acquainted  with  that 
message  and  able  to  govern  each  his  own  life  in  ac- 
cordance with  it.  This  education  in  revealed  religion 
demands  and  receives  one  day  in  seven  set  apart  for 
its  exclusive  purpose,  besides  its  daily  recognition  in 
the  presence  of  secular  labor. 

Again,  our  civilization  sets  apart  a  learned  profes- 
sion to  master  the  Jgwa,  by  which  justice  is  secured 
between  man  and  man.  The  protection  of  life  and 
property  and  the  punishment  of  crime,  the  ordinances 
by  which  individuals  combine  to  form  social  aggregates 
for  the  prosecution  of  business,  to  provide  for  the  wel- 
fare of  towns,  cities,  counties,  states,  and  the  nation — 
all  these  proceed  from  a  Roman  origin,  and  were,  in  the 
first  instance,  taught  by  the  Roman  praetorian  courts 
that  followed  in  the  wake  of  Roman  armies  and  made 
secure  their  conquests  by  establishing  Roman  jurispru- 
dence in  the  place  of  the  local  laws  and  customs  that 
had  before  prevailed;  for  the  Latin  mind  had  pon- 
dered a  thousand  years  on  the  forms  of  the  will,  dis- 
covering, one  by  one,  the  limitations  of  individual  ca- 
price and  arbitrariness  necessary  to  prevent  collision 
of  the  individual  with  the  social  whole.  The  Latin. 
lessop  to  the  world  tftap.b^^s  Tis_how  to  frame  iaaa  and 
guide  the  individual  in  such  ways  as  to  make  all  his 
deeds  affirmative  of  the  whole  purpose  of  his  commu- 


EDITOR'S  PREFACE.  vii 

nity  and  nation,  and  cause  him  to  inhibit  all  such 
deeds  as  tend  toward  trespass  or  any  injury  of  others. 
This  goes  to  make  each  person  strong  through  the  cor- 
porate will  of  his  community  and  nation.  It  prevents 
the  collision  of  each  with  all — a  collision  which  reduces 
to  zero  all  reasonable  action. 

The  modern  system  of  education  in  Europe  and 
America  places  the  study  of  Latin  in  all  secondary  and 
higher  education  as  a  first  essential  side  by  side  with 
mathematics  in  the  school  studies.  This  secures  for 
youth  from  three  to  seven  years'  daily  occupation  with 
the  workings  of  the  Latin  mind.  The  boy  or  the  girl 
gradually  becomes  permeated  with  the  motives  of  that 
serious-minded  people.  The  special  significance  of 
those  words  that  express  the  ideals  of  Koman  charac- 
ter (and  the  ideals  of  all  character),  words  which  we 
have  preserved  in  our  translation  into  English — grav- 
ity, soberness,  probity,  honesty,  self-restraint,  austerity, 
considerateness,  modesty,  patriotism — impresses,  his 
mind  deeply  as  a  result  of  long-continued  study  of 
Eoman  literature  and  history.* 

But  there  is  a  third  people  and  a  third  language 
which  we  recognize  in  secondary  and  higher  educa- 
tion. jWe  place  the  Greek  language  before  the  pupil- 
for  its  influence  on^hia_jnind  in  opening  it  to  the 
vision_of^ science,  art^  and  literature.  The  Greeks  in- 
vented all  the  potent  literary  forms — epic,  lyric,  and 
dramatic.  They  transformed  architecture  and  sculp- 
ture into  shapes  that  reveal  spiritual  freedom.     They 

*  See  Rosenkranz,  Philosophy  of  Education,  vol.  i  of  this 
series,  page  233 :  "  The  Latin  tongue  is  crowded  with  expressions 
which  paint  presence  of  mind,  the  effort  at  reflection,  a  critical 
attitude  of  mind,  the  importance  of  self-control." 


viii  EDITOR'S  PREFACE. 

discovered,  in  fact,  the  beautiful  in  its  highest  forms 
as  the  manifestation  of  freedom  or  self-determination. 
Besides  the  beautiful  they  also  found  the  true,  and  ex- 
plored its  forms  in  science  and  philosophy.  Science 
and  gesthetics  treat  of  the  two  forms  of  the  intellect, 
just  as  jurisprudence  treats  of  the  forms  of  the  will. 
I  Thus  Greece  educates  all  modern  nations  in  the  forms 
of  art  and  literature,  while  Eome  educates  them  in 
civil  law. 

In  the  beginning  Greece  is  only  aesthetic,  worship- 
ing beautiful  individualities,  the  gods  of  Olympus. 
From  the  beginning  it  prizes  its  athletic  games  as  a 
sort  of  worship  of  the  beautiful  by  realizing  graceful- 
ness and  physical  freedom  in  the  body.  Later  it  fixes 
in  stone  and  bronze  the  forms  of  its  athletes  as  models 
and  sets  them  up  in  temples  as  statues  of  the  gods. 
Gracefulness  is  well  said  to  be  the  expression  of  spirit- 
ual freedom  in  bodily  form.  The  soul  is  represented 
as  in  complete  control  of  the  body,  so  that  every  move- 
ment and  every  pose  shows  the  limbs  completely  obe- 
dient to  the  slightest  impulse  of  the  soul.  There  is 
other  art  than  Greek  ;  we  have  Egyptian  and  Hindu, 
Chinese,  Persian,  and  Etruscan,  but  no  art  that  has 
any  success  in  depicting  gracefulness  or  individual 
freedom.  Even  Christian  art  of  Italy,  Germany,  and 
France  does  not  attain  to  supreme  gracefulness  as  does 
the  Greek.  For,  while  Greek  art  succeeds  in  repre- 
senting freedom  m  the  body,  Romantic  art  represents 
freedom  from  the  body,  or  at  least  a  heart-hunger  for 
such  freedom.  The  martyr  saints  painted  by  Fra 
Angelico  and  the  dead  Christs  of  Volterra,  Michel 
Angelo,  and  Rubens,  all  show  an  expression  of  relief 
or  divine  repose  having  in  view  the  final  liberation 


EDITOR'S  PREFACE.  ix 

from  the  body.  Religion  in  its  essence  is  a  higher 
form  of  spiritual  activity  than  art.  But  Christian  art 
is  not  so  high  a  form  of  art  as  Greek  art,  because  it 
represents  freedom  only  negatively  as  separation  from 
the  body  rather  than  positively  as  full  incarnation  in 
the  body  like  the  Olympian  Zeus  or  the  Apollo  Bel- 
vedere. 

Inasmuch  as  art  is  the  consecration  of  what  is  sen- 
suous and  physical  to  the  purposes  of  spiritual  free- 
dom, it  forever  piques  the  soul  to  ascend  out  of  the 
stage  of  sense  -  perception  into  reflection  and  free 
thought.  To  solve  the  mystery  of  self-determination 
in  the  depths  of  pure  thinking  is  to  grasp  the  sub- 
stance of  which  highest  art  is  only  the  shadow.  Thus 
the  glorious  career  of  Greek  philosophy  from  Thales, 
through  Heraclitus,  Pythagoras,  and  Anaxagoras  to  its 
consummation  in  Socrates,  Plato,  and  Aristotle  is  the 
process  by  which  inner  reflection  attains  the  same 
completeness  and  perfection  that  art  had  attained  un- 
der Pheidias  and  Praxiteles.  Art  has,  moreover,  a 
link  connecting  it  with  philosophy.  The  dramas  of 
-^schylus  and  Sophocles  grapple  with  the  problems  of 
Greek  life,  the  relation  of  fate  to  freedom,  the  limits 
of  human  responsibility  and  the  motives  of  Divine 
Providence.  Thus  art  prompts  to  thought  on  the 
questions  of  ultimate  moral  import  and,  in  a  word,  to 
"  theology,  or  first  philosophy,"  as  Aristotle  names  his 
treatise  on  metaphysics. 

Prof.  Davidson  has  in  this  volume  sketched  in  a 
masterly  manner  the  growth  of  the  Greek  civilization 
through  the  several  stages  of  the  household,  the  village 
community,  and  its  culmination  in  the  Athenian  city 
state  to  its  dissolution  in  the  oicumenical  or  universal 


X  EDITOR'S  PREFACE. 

empire  of  Rome.  He  has  discussed  the  relative  value 
of  the  ideals  of  Greek  civilization  compared  with  those 
of  the  previous  civilization  out  of  which  it  grew,  and 
of  the  Christian  civilization  to  which  it  lent  one  after 
another  many  substantial  elements.  These  elements 
he  has  characterized  as  Hellenized  Judaism  and  Zoro- 
astrianism,  Xeo-Pythagoreanism,  and  Orientalized  Hel- 
lenism, all  of  which  entered  into  conflict  with  Chris- 
tianity, but  finally  gave  up  to  it  what  they  had  of  per- 
manent value,  and  disappeared  from  history.  He  has 
shown  how  the  "  supernatural  sense,"  or  the  spiritual 
sense  of  the  divine  as  personal  God,  is  the  dominating 
and  progressive  principle  in  Christianity,  and  how  it 
has  modified  and  assimilated  the  Greek  philosophy, 
from  which  it  has  borrowed  its  logical  and  scientific 
forms. 

Attention  is  particularly  called  to  our  author's 
treatment  of  Diagoge  (page  49  and  following)  as  the 
ideal  of  Greek  life — namely,  the  occupation  of  the  soul 
with  the  contemplation  of  the  beautiful  in  art  and  lit- 
erature, and  with  the  search  for  the  true  by  the  exer- 
cise of  reflection  in  science  and  philosophy — what  we 
call,  since  the  time  of  Goethe,  the  aims  of  culture. 

Particular  attention  is  recommended  to  the  discus- 
sion of  the  insights  of  Socrates  in  the  fifth  chapter — 
namely,  his  insight  into  the  deeper  meaning  of  the 
oracle  "  know  thyself,"  and  his  insight  obtained  by  the 
use  of  the  supernatural  sense  (his  "  daimon  ").  He 
saw  that  difference  of  opinion  among  men,  and  conse- 
quently immorality  and  civil  contention,  arises  from 
the  fact  that  men  think  imperfectly  and  one-sidedly, 
and  hence  do  not  see  the  full  logical  bearing  of  their 
own  thoughts  (see  page  108).    His  famous  "  dialectic  " 


EDITOR'S  PREFACE.  xi 

had  for  its  object  the  drawing  out  into  consciousness 
of  the  complete  thought  with  all  its  logical  implica-/ 
tions.  In  this  process  the  narrow  and  superficial  andl 
immoral  views  were  exposed  and  refuted  and  the  uni- 
versally valid  truth  remained. 

This  discovery  amounts  to  the  demonstration  that 
man  possesses  "a  universal  divine  element,  which  is 
indeed  the  measure  of  all  things.  .  .  .  This  was  the 
greatest  discovery  ever  made  by  any  human  being,  and 
the  one  that  renders  possible  moral  life,  whether  indi- 
vidual, social,  or  political  "  (page  171).  This  made 
possible  the  assent  from  opinion  to  truth ;  from  soph- 
istry to  the  vision  of  God. 

Finally,  the  reader  is  directed  to  the  argument  of 
Chapter  VIII,  by  which  the  author  establishes  his 
doctrine  that  .the  failure  of  the  Greeks  to  furnish  an 
oecumenical  or  universal  religion  sufficient  for  the 
world  empire  of  the  Roman  epoch  is  due  to  their  lack 
of  the  supernatural  sense,  by  which  the  concrete  per- 
sonality  of  the  absolute  is  apprehended  (pages  193-/ 
201).  The  author  sums  up  his  conclusions  on  pages 
225,  226  :  "Until  the  supernatural  sense  can  recognize 
in  its  object  a  living  God,  or  being  with  perfect  intel- 
ligence, love,  and  will,  supernally  correlated,  but  in  no 
sense  identical  with  the  spirits  of  men,  so  that  His 
perfections  are  their  goal,  and  not  His  being  their 
grave,  it  will  never  be  able  to  maintain  itself  against 
the  abstracting  reason  or  supply  the  basis  of  moral 
life."  W.  T.  Harkis.' 

WAsmNGTON,  D.  C,  September,  1894, 


'^^ 


(T 


PEEFACE. 


In"  my  recent  book,  Aristotle  and  the  Ancient 
Educational  Ideals^  1  endeavored  to  set  forth  the 
facts  of  Greek  education  in  historical  order.  The 
present  brief  work  has  an  entirely  different  purpose — 
which  is^o  show  how  the  Greek  people  were  gradu- 
ally educated  up  to  that  stage  of  culture  which  made 
them  the  teachers  of  the  whole  world,  and  what  the 
effect  of  that  teaching  has  been.  Hence  education,  in 
its  narrow,  pedagogic  sense,  is  presented  but  in  the 
barest  outline,  while  prominence  is  given  to  the  dif- 
ferent stages,  in  the.  growth  of  the  Greek  political, 
ethical,  and  religious  consciousness,  and  the  effect  of 
this  upon  Greek  history  and  institutions,  as  well  as 
upon  the  after-world.    '■ 

This  work  is  not  intended  for  scholars  or  special- 
ists, but  for  that  large  body  of  teachers  throughout 
the  country  who  are  trying  to  do  their  duty,  but  are 
suffering  from  that  want  of  enthusiasm  which  neces- 
sarily comes  from  being  unable  "clearly  to  see  the  end 
and  purpose  of  their  labors,  or  to  invest  any  end  with 
sublime  import.  I  have  sought  to  show  them  that  the 
end  of  their  work  is  the  redemption  of  humanity,  an 
essential  part  of  that  process  by  which  it  is  being  grad- 
ually elevated  to  moral  freedom,  and  to  suggest  to 


xiv        EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

them  the  direction  in  which  they  ought  to  turn  their 
chief  efforts.  If  I  can  make  even  a  few  of  them  feel 
the  consecration  that  comes  from  single-minded  devo- 
tion to  a  great  end,  I  shall  hold  that  this  book  has 
accomplished  its  purpose. 

If  any  one  tell  me  that  my  first  chapter  ought  to 
have  been  the  last  in  order,  I  shall  not  disagree  with 
him.  I  put  it  where  it  is  in  order  that  the  reader 
might  peruse  the  rest  of  theni  with  certain  preconcep- 
tions in  his  mind,  and  that  he  might  clearly  know, 
whenever  he  met  the  term  "education,"  what  I  meant 
by  it.  Those  who  prefer  to  start  with  their  own  con- 
ceptions of  education  may  read  that  lecture  last. 

I  have  undertaken  a  large  task  in  a  small  compass, 
and  no  one  can  feel  more  keenly  than  I  do  how  imper- 
fectly I  have  accomplished  it.  Under  any  circum- 
stances my  work  must  have  been  a  mere  sketch ;  but 
it  is  only  now  that  it  is  finished  that  I  know  how 
much  better  it  might  be  done  by  one  with  resources 
greater  than  mine.  May  the  defects  of  my  attempt 
prove  a  challenge  to  such  a  one  to  produce  a  work 
worthy  of  the  subject ! 

Thomas  Davidsoi^. 

"  Glenmore,"  Keene,  Essex  County,  N.  Y., 
May  15,  1893. 


COlt^TElSTTS. 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I. — Introductory — Nature  and  Education        .        .  1 

II. — Greek  Life  and  its  Ideals 29 

III. — Greek  Education  before  the  Rise  of  Philosophy  53 

IV. — Greek  Education  after  the  Rise  op  Philosophy  .  78 

v.— The  Effort  to  find  in  Individualism  a  Basis  of 

Social  Order 103 

VI.— The  Endeavor  to  found  an  Educational  State 

on  Philosophical  Principles,  and  its  Results  .  128 

VII. — The  Attempt  to  found  an  Educational  State 
ON  Inductive  Scientific  Principles  and  its 
Results 152 

VIII.— Greek  Education  in  Contact  with  the  Great 

Eastern  World 177 

IX.f— Greek  Education  in  Contact  with  the  Great 

Western  World — Resume  and  Conclusion       .  203 


.1  ^ 


[TJRITSI13ITT, 


THE  EDUCATION 
OF  THE   GREEK   PEOPLE, 


CHAPTER  I. 

IIJTRODUCTORY. 
NATURE   AKD   EDUCATION. 

The  term  "  nature,"  as  applied  to  living  things,  is 
used  in  two  distinct  senses,  which  in  current  language 
are  frequently  confounded,  to  the  great  detriment  of 
educational  theory  and  practice.  In  one  sense,  it  is  the 
character  or  type  with.which  a  thing  starts  on  its  sepa- 
rate career,  and  which,  without  any  effort  on  the  part 
of  that  thing,  but  solely  with  the  aid  of  natural  forces, 
determines  that  career.  Thus  the  acorn,  the  bean,  the 
chick,  the  whelp,  the  cub,  possess  a  definite  "  nature," 
which  in  each  case  manifests  itself  naturally  in  the  life 
of  these  things.  In  the  other  sense,  "  nature  "  means 
that 'highest  possible  reality  which  a  living  thing, 
through  a  series  of  voluntary  acts,  originating  within 
or  without  it,  may  be  made  to  attain.  Thus,  through 
voluntary  acts  originating  outside  of  them,  many 
plants  and  animals — the  rose,  the  chrysanthemum, 
the  apple,  the  orange,  the  dog,  the  horse — attain  a 


2  EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

degree  of  perfection  which  would  be  impossible  for 
them  if  left  to  themselves.  Similarly,  through  volun- 
tary acts  originating  inside  of  him,  man  attains  a  de- 
gree of  perfection  to  which  his  so-called  natural  in- 
stincts could  never  raise  him.  If,  now,  we  distinguish 
these  two  natures  as  original  and  ideal^  we  may  say 
that,  in  the  world  known  to  us,  man  is  the  only  being 
able  to  originate  the  acts  whereby  he  is  raised  from  his 
original  to  his  ideal  nature.  The  sum  or  system  of 
these  acts  is  what  we  call  education,  and  this  is  per- 
haps  the  best"d^eBmtioh'of~that  term,  in  its  widest 
sense,  that  can  be  given.  When  man  employs  these 
acts  to  raise  creatures  other  than  himself,  we  call  the 
result  culture,  training,  breeding,  etc. 

We  often  hear  it  said  that  the  aim  of  education  is  to 
develop  the  "  nature  "  of  the  child,  that  his  "  nature  " 
must  not  be  crossed,  that  whatever  he  is  called  upon  to 
do  must  be  "  natural,"  and  so  on.  If  the  distinction 
above  made  is  correct,  it  is  obvious  that,  in  employing 
f-uch  i^hrases,  we  must  keep  it  clearly  before  our  minds, 
unless  we  are  to  be  champions  of  confusion.  If  we 
mean  that  the  purpose  of  education  is  to  develop  the 
child's  nature,  in  the  first  sense  of  that  term,  we  mean 
something  that  is  altogether  false  and  perverse.  It  is 
only  when  we  use  "  nature  "  in  the  second  sense  that 
H  such  phrases  express  truth.  The^aim~  of"  education  is 
^v  ^^  develop  man's  ideal  nature,  which  may  be,  and  very 
'*_.-  often  is,  so  different  from  his  original  nature  that,  in 
order  to  make  way  for  the  former,  the  latter  may  have 
to  be  crossed,  defied,  and  even  to  a  large  extent  sup- 
pressed. Tried  by  the  standard  of  the  original  nature, 
the  ideal  nature  is  frequently  and  largely  unnatural. 
When  the  Apostle  Paul  (1  Cor.  ii,  14)   says,  "The 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  3 

natural  man  receiveth  not  the  things  of  the  Spirit  of 
God,"  he  is  only  expressing  this  truth  in  the  language 
of  religion ;  and  the  whole  doctrine  of  Original  Sin  is 
founded  upon  the  same.  The  fact  is,  nothing  could 
be  more  prejudicial  to  the  best  interests  of  education 
than  any  attempt  to  evoke  indiscriminately  the  tend- 
encies of  the  child's  original  nature.  Hence,  all 
the  popular  talk  about  developing  the  child's  "spon- 
taneity "  is  little  more  than  sentimental  cant,  likely 
enough  to  do  incalculable  mischief. 

^^ducation,  then,  in  so  far  as  it  depends  upon  coAr^ 
scious  exertion,  is  "that  processHBy"  which,  a  humah^ 
2^  being  is  enabled  to  transcend  his  original  nature  and 
^--^tain  his  ideal  nature,  or  be  the  most  desirable  thing 
that  he  canbe.  Tliis  e^nd  attained  js  hi^^ood. '.  If 
this  be  true,  the  first  question  that  presents  itself  to 
the  educator  is:  Wherein  does  man's  ideal  nature,  or 
g;ood3  consist ?  and  the  second:  How  does  this  stand 
related  to  his  original  nature  ?  The  second  presents  . 
ho  difficulty  when  the  first  is  answered ;  but  the  first 
is  so  far  from  easy  that  many  and  widely  divergent 
answers  have  been  given  to  it.  The  Buddha,  for  ex- 
ample, makes  man's  good  consist  in  the  complete  sup- 
pression of  selfhood ;  Plato,  in  the  vision  of  eWnal 
ideas,  those  everlasting  and  perfect  models  of  which 
the  things  of  sense  are  but  transient  and  imperfect 
copies ;  Aristotle,  in  the  exercise  of  man's  highest  or 
characteristic  faculty,  viz.,  his  reason ;  Zeno,  in  a  life 
according  to  nature — a  life  attainable  ^nly  through  the 
supremacy  of  reason,  which  alone  cognizes  the  order 
of  nature ;  Epicurus,  in  the  enjoyment  of  calm,  abid- 
ing pleasure ;  Jesus,  in  absolute  submission  to  the  will  '^• 
of  God;  Dante  and  the  mediaeval  saints,  in  the  vision 


4  EDUCATION  OF  THE.  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

or  enjoyment  of  God  (Deo  frui) ;  Goethe,  Comte,  and 
most  modern  humanitarians,  in  devotion  to  the  well- 
being,  variously  defined,  of  humanity ;  many  English, 
French,  and  Italian  thinkers  of  last  century  and  this, 
hi  pleasure,  variously  conceived ;  Kant, in  a  goodwill ; 
Hegel,  in  conscious  freedom  ;  Von  Hartmann,  in  sub- 
mission to  suffering,  for  the  sake  of  relieving  God  from 
misery,  and  enabling  him  to  reach  unconsciousness 
and  annihilation ;  and  so  on.  Widely  different  as  these 
views  seem  to  be,  we  shall  find,  on  examining  them, 
that  they  have  an  important  tenet  in  common.  ^They 
all  hold  that  man's  ideal  nature  can  be  realized  only 
in  a^system  of  relations  including  himself  and  his 
eiivironmentrTJfiafTs^TTnot^self." 
the  manner  in  which  they  conceive  the  self  and  the 
not-self,  their  nature  and  possibilities.  When,  for 
example,  Epicurus  tells  men  to  look  for  their  highest 
condition  in  such  a  relation  to  their  inner  and  outer 
world  as  shall  secure  them  abiding  pleasure,  and  when 
Jesus  tells  them  to  look  for  it  in  a  relation  of  absolute 
conformity  to  the  will  of  God,  the  only  difference  in 
the  two  counsels  lies  in  the  fact  that  the  one  conceives 
the  Avorld  as  essentially  sensuous,  the  other  as  essen- 
tially moral  and  divine.  Both  alike  bid  men  look  for 
their  highest  condition  in  a  harmonious  relation  to  the 
world  or  universe,  as  they  respectively  conceive  it — the 
one  counseling  selfish  prudence,  the  highest  possible 
virtue  in  a  sensuous  world ;  the  other,  morality  and 
self-devotion,  which  imply  a  divine  world. 

Inasmuch,  then,  as  the  divergent  answers  given  to 
the  question,  Wherein  consists  man's  ideal  nature? 
are  due  to  different  conceptions  of  the  universe  and 
man's  place  in  it,  we  shall  not  obtain  any  satisfactory 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  5 

answer  to  it  until  we,  reack  tlie  true  conception  of  the 
nature  of  the  universe — until,  at  least,  we  make  up  our 
minds  whether  it,is,  in  its  essence,  material  and  sensu- 
ous, or  spiritual  and  moral.  In  trying  to  decide  this 
question,  we  shall  appeal  in  vain  to  the  conflicting 
views  of  philosophers  and  would-be  philosophers. 
Eather  must  we  turn  to  the  common  consciousness 
of  mankind,  as  revealed  in  its  moral  estimates  and 
practice.  And  here,  if  we  listen  without  prejudice, 
we  shall  meet  with  no  uncertain  answer.  Whatever 
thinkers  of  the  Epicurean  school  may,  say  in  favor  of 
their  view,  men,  in  proportion  as  they  advance  in 
civilization,  do  more  and  more  despise  him  who  seeks 
his  chief  good  in  pleasure,  and  more  and  more  honor 
him  who,  indifferent  to  pleasure,  seeks  and  finds  his 
satisfaction  in  moral  action.  And  the  facts  of  h'  ••;ian\ 
life  and  history  confirm  this  verdict  of  the  commouy 
consciousness.  Individuals  or  nations  devoted  to 
pleasure,  as  their  supreme  good,  soon  sink  into  degra- 
dation or  slavery,  while  those  devoted  to  rational  ends 
prosper,  and  hold  their  own,  often  against  fearful 
odds. 

Trusting  to  the  double  testimony  of  the  common 
consciousness  and  of  history,  we  may  rationally  con- 
clude that,  in  its  deepest  essence,  the  world  is  moral 
and  spiritual,  and  that  the  relations  whose  realization 
constitutes  man's  "ideal  nature,"  or  good,  are  moral 
relations.  In  saying,  then,  that  education  is  the 
process  by  which  human  beings  are  raised  from  their 
)riginal  nature  to  their  ideal  nature,  we  mean  that  it 
s  what  raises  them  from  a  sensuous  life,  governed  by 
nstinct,  to  a  moral  life,  govornfid  hy  rpflRpn,  It  is 
iiow  easy  enough  to'aiiswei"  our  second  question,  and 


6  EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

to  determine  the  relation  in  which  man's  ideal  nature 
stands  to  his  original  nature.  It  is  a  relation  of  master 
to  servant.  It  is  the  part  of  the  ideal  nature  to  com- 
mand ;  of  the~original  nature,  to  obey.  This  mnst  not-^ 
be  understood  to  mean  that  the  original  nature  is  to 
be  regarded  as  base  and  sinful,  and  to  be  starved  or 
haughtily  suppressed,  as  is  often  assumed  by  men  of 
the  ascetic  type.  (On  the  contrary,  since  life  in  its 
highest  conceivable  form  is  but  passion  guided  by 
reason,  and  reason  has  no  other  function  than  to 
guide  passion,  the  richness  of  the  higher  and  com- 
manding nature  will  be  exactly  proportioned  to  the 
number,  complexity,  and  robustness  of  the  passions 
that  have  to  be  regulated.?  It  is  only  the  dispropor- 
tionate robustness  of  particular  passions  that  has  to 
"be  rippressed. 

In  saying  that  man's  ideal  nature  is  his  moral 
nature,  we  have  by  no  means  made  clear  what  is  im- 
plied by  the  latter  term.  And  there  are  few  terms 
connected  with  education  which  stand  more  in  need 
of  clear  definition.  It  is  not  unusual  to  hear  the 
moral  nature  of  man  spoken  of  as  if  it  were  some- 
thing independent  of  the  rest  of  his  being,  something 
that  could  be  cultivated  by  itself,  apart  from  his  in- 
telligence and  his  sensuous  nature.  Xor  is  it  difficult 
to  see  why  this  mistake  has  been  made.  People  are 
continually  tempted  to  confound  actions  which  con- 
form to  a  recognized  standard,  or  which  contribute  to 
social  well-being,  with  moral  actions.  Xow,  it  is  cer- 
tainly true  that  actions  of  the  former  kind  are  prefer- 
able to  lawless  or  anarchic  actions,  and  also  that  their 
performance  may,  to  a  large  extent,  be  secured  by  a 
one-sided  training  through  habit,  or  even  by  appeal  to 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  7 

a  single  passion — namely,  fear.  Not  to  speak  of  sav- 
ages and  barbarians,  who,  through  sheer  force  of  tribal 
custom,  habitually  perform  such  actions,  and  are 
therefore  held,  to  a  certain  degree  justly,  to  possess 
many  virtues,  we  see  that  even  dogs,  cats,  and  other 
brute  creatures  can  be  trained  by  habit,  or  by  pleasure 
and  pain,  to  perform  them.  But  although  in  the  case 
of  men  such  training  forms  an  excellent  preparation 
for  moral  life,  and  may  therefore  fairly  be  considered 
a  part  of  education,  it  does  not  in  itself  insure  such 
life,  since  moral  life  can  not  be  brought  about  by  any 
such  process.  Moral  life  is  life  consciously  conducted 
in  conformity  with  the  laws  by  which  man  can  live  as 
a  rational  being,  and  increase  the  plenitude  of  that 
being,  and  such  life  depends  upon  the  cultivation  of 
all  his  powers,  mental  and  bodily. 

A  very  little  consideration  will  convince  us  that  this 
is  true :  Man's  spiritual  faculties  *  naturally  range 
themselves  in  three  classes — (1)  rational,  (2)  emotional 
or  affectional,  (3)  volitional  or  active.  His  bodily  pow- 
ers, for  our  present  purpose,  may  be  regarded  as  all 
belonging  to  one  class,  though  they  naturally  enough 
fall  into  two — the  receptive  and  the  motor.  Each  of 
these  faculties  faces,  so  to  speak,  two  ways — toward 
the  world  of  nature  and  toward  the  world  of  spirit. 
Eeason,  for  example,  obtains  through  the  bodily  senses 
the  data  with  which  it,  spontaneously  constructs  the 
natural  world ;   through   the   spiritual   sense,f   those 

*  On  the  right  to  use  this  term,  see  Martineau,  Types  of 
Ethical  Theory,  vol.  ii,  pp.  11  sqq. 

f  This  from  the  days  of  Jerome  onward  was  called  by  the 
Church  tliinkers  synderesis  {awriip'ricns) ;  in  the  Middle  Age, 
sometimes  the  apex  of  tlie  mind  {apex  mentis).    See  an  excellent 


EDUCATION  OF  TIJE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 


through  which  it  voluntarily  constructs  the  spiritual 
world.*  And  what  reason  constructs,  love  aspires  to, 
and  will  seeks  to  realize  in  concrete  form.  There  is  a 
natural  love  and  there  is  a  spiritual  love,t  a  natural 
will  and  a  spiritual  will,|  Between  these  two  worlds — 
that  of  nature  and  that  of  spirit — man's  lot  is  cast. 
They  furnish  the  conditions  under  which  he  is  called 
upon  to  live,  and  his  life  consists  in  a  more  or  less  per- 
fect adaptation  to  them.  Much  is  said  at  the  present 
day  of  the  "  survival  of  the  fittest."  '  The  fittest  are 
those  who  stand  in  the  most  complete  relation  to  the 
two  worlds.  '.  Now,  it  is  clear  enough  that  a  man  can 
not  live  in  accordance  with  the  conditions  of  rational 
life  without  knowing  them,  and  that  he  can  not  know 
them  unless  his  intelligence  is  cultivated.  As  civiliza- 
tion advances,  these  conditions  become  more  and  more 
complicated,  and  therefore  demand  for  their  compre- 
hension an  ever-increasing  cultivation  of  the  intelli- 
gence. The  cultivation  that  sufficed  to  enable  a  man 
to  live  rationally  in  the  time  of  Homer,  or  Plato,  or 
Caesar,  or  Alfred,  or  even  of  Washington,  is  altogether 
insufficient  for  the  man  of  the  present  day,  and  there 
can  be  no  greater  or  more  fatal  mistake  in  education 
than  to  ignore  this  fact.^^very  age  demands  an  edu- 
cation of  the  intelligence  suited  to  its  own  conditions/' 

essay  on  the  Culture  of  the  Spiritual  Sense,  in  Brother  Azarias's 
Phases  of  Thought  and  Criticism,  pp.  72-88. 

*  In  making  this  distinction  between  the  natural  and  spir- 
itual worlds,  I  am  not  championing  any  form  of  ultimate  dual- 
ism. Indeed,  the  whole  question  of  dualism  and  monism  seems 
to  me  little  less  than  stupid,  a  mere  contest  about  words. 

f  See  Dante,  Purg.,  xvii,  91  sqq. 

i  Ibid.,  xxi,  CI  sqq. 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.    - , 

'  X      9 
But  it  is  not  enough  for  a  man  to  understand  thdx^ 

ditions  of  rational  life  in  his  own  time ;  he  must  li 
wise  love  these  conditions,  and  hate  whatever  leads  to 
life  of  an  opposite  kind.  This  is  only  another  way  of 
saying  that  he  must  love  the  good  and  hate  the  evil ; 
for  the  good  is  simply  what  conduces  to  rational  or 
moral  life,  and  the  evil  merely  what  leads  away  from 
it.  But  he  can  not  do  this  unless  his  affectional  nature 
is  carefully  trained,  so  that  he  loves  each  person  and 
thiug  with  whom  or  which  he  has  to  deal  in  pro- 
portion to  his  or  its  value  for  moral  ends.  It  is  per- 
fectly obvious,  as  soon  as  it  is  pointed  out,  that  all  im- 
moral life  is  due  to  a  false  distribution  of  affection, 
which  again  is  often,  though  by  no  means  always,  due 
to  a  want  of  intellectual  cultivation.  He  that  attrib- 
utes to  anything  a  value  greater  or  less  than  it  really 
possesses  in  the  order  of  things  has  already  placed  him- 
self in  a  false  relation  to  it,  and  will  certainly,  when  he 
comes  to  act  with  reference  to  it,  act  immorally.  But, 
again,  it  is  not  enough  for  a  man  to  understand  cor- 
rectly and  love  duly  tlie  conditions  of  moral  life  in  his 
own  time ;  he  must,  still  further,  be  willing  and  able 
to  fulfill  these  conditions.  And  he  certainly  can  not 
do  this  unless  his  will  is  trained  to  perfect  freedom,  so 
that  it  responds,  with  the  utmost  readiness,  to  the  sug- 
gestions of  his  discriminating  intelligence  and  the 
movements  of  his  chastened  affections.  But  even  this 
is  not  enough ;  or  rather,  perhaps,  we  ought  to  say  that 
not  one  of  these  spiritual  conditions  can  be  realized 
unless  the  powers  of  the  body  are  in  full  health  and 
strength.  When  the  blood  is  sluggish,  the  nerves 
weak,  or  the  digestion  impaired,  then  the  intellect  is 
clouded,  the  affections  are  morbid,  the  will  is  enfec- 


LOCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE.  " 

\0 

.led.     "  The  whole  head  is  sick  and  the  whole  heart 
faint." 

Moral  life,  therefore — man's  ideal  nature — de- 
mands for  its  realization  the  education  of  all  his  pow- 
ers, bodily  and  mental.  Having  established  this  gen- 
eral but  important  conclusion,  we  must  next  descend 
to  particulars  and  inquire  what^^ortjof  ^eduGation  each 
of  the  faculties  must  receive,  in  order  that  it  may  con-' 
tribute  its  due  share  to  the  desired  result ;  in  a  word, 
;  how  the  body,  the  intellect,  the  affections,  and  the  will 
I  must  be  trained.  Now,  inasmuch  as  they  must  obvi- 
ously be  trained  with  due  regard  to  their  natural  hier- 
archy and  order  of  development,  we  must  begin  our 
inquiry  by  asking.  What  is  the  natural  hierarchy  of  the 
human  powers  ?  In  what  order  do  they  naturally  de- 
velop ?  And  these  questions  are  so  far  from  being  easy 
to  answer  that  widely  different  replies,  both  theoretical 
and  practical,  have  been  given  to  them  at  different 
periods  and  by  different  educators.  Some  have  thought 
that  education  ought  to  begin  with  the  body ;  others, 
with  the  intellect,  or  at  least  some  faculty  of  it; 
others,  with  the  will ;  and  others,  with  the  affections ; 
and  not  a  few  have  thought  that  certain  faculties 
might  without  danger  be  neglected  altogether,  or  left 
to  take  care  of  themselves.  In  a  large  part  of  mediae- 
val Europe,  and  even  till  recently  among  ourselves, 
bodily  education  was  neglected  or  even  contemned, 
while  at  the  present  day  the  affections  and  the  will 
are  almost  everywhere  suffering  from  a  similar  neglect. 
In  trying  to  reach  a  correct  conclusion  in  this  mat- 
ter, we  must  beware  of  assuming  that  the  natural  hi- 
erarchy of  the  powers  necessarily  coincides  with  their 
order  of  development.     This  is,  indeed,  a  matter  for 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  H 

careful  consideration,  in  which  the  first  step  is  to  dis- 
cover the  order  in  which  the  powers  naturally  develop. 
And  this  is  easy  enough ;  for  it  is  obvious  that  the 
bodily  powers  or  functions — digestion,  secretion,  etc. — 
develop  first ;  then  that  portion  of  the  intellectual  fac- 
ulties which  accomplishes  sense  perception,  and  simul- 
taneously with  these  the  natural  instincts  or  prefer- 
ences ;  and  lastly,  if  ever,  the  reflective  faculties  of  the 
intellect  and  their  correlate,  the  will.*  It  is  clear, 
also,  that  this  order  of  development  coincides  with  the 
natural  hierarchy  of  the  human  powers.  Ee verting 
now  to  our  previous  distinction  between  the  original 
and  the  ideal  nature  of  man,  we  can  readily  see  that 
education,  in  aiming  to  realize  the  latter,  seeks  to  do 
so  by  substituting  for  the  natural  order  of  development 
an  order  which  may  fairly  enough  be  called  supernatu- 
ral, if  by  that  we  mean  belonging  to  a  higher  order  in 
nature ;  for,  indeed,  the  whole  aim  of  education  is  to 
develop  intellectual  reflection  and  will  from  the  earliest 
possible  moment  in  life,  and  to  apply  them  from  the 
very  first  to  the  regulation  of  the  lower  faculties.  In 
saying  this,  we  are,  of  course,  only  saying,  in  other 
words,  that  the  aim  of  education  is  to  make  men  intel- 
ligent and  moral  beings,  instead  of  beings  living  by 
sense  and  instinct,  or  wilfulness. 

What  has  just  been  said  enables  us  to  deal  intelli- 
gently with  the  often-repeated  pedagogical  maxim, 
that  education  must  seek  to  unfold  the  powers  of  the 
.child  in  accordance  with  their  natural  order  of  develop- 

*  We  must  not,  of  course,  confound  will  with  wilfulness. 
The  latter  is  the  very  opposite  of  will,  being  mere  unregulated 
instinct. 


12         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

ment.  Before  we  can  accept  such  a  maxim  we  must 
understand  in  what  sense  the  word  "  natural "  is  used, 
whether  it  refers  to  man's  original,  or  to  hi?  ideal, 
nature.  Indeed,  we  can  accept  it  only  if  it  is  used 
with  reference  to  the  latter.  It  is  not  true  that  edu- 
cation should  seek  to  call  forth  the  powers  of  the  child 
according  to  their  order  of  development  in  his  original 
nature ;  that  is,  to  evoke  sense  perception  and  instinct 
before  reflection  and  will.  On  the  contrary,  it  should 
seek  to  introduce  reflection  into  every  act  of  percep- 
tion, and  will  into  every  movement  of  instinct,  from 
the  earliest  possible  moment.  It  is  to  a  neglect  of  this 
important  distinction  that  are  due  the  stress  which  has 
of  recent  years  been  laid  upon  mere  object-teaching 
as  a  means  of  "  educating  the  senses,"  and  the  well- 
meant,  but  fatal,  attempts  of  kindly  parents  to  educate 
their  children  by  leaving  them  to  the  guidance  of  their 
own  "  spontaneity." 

In  any  order  of  development  of  the  human  powers, 
those  of  the  body,  in  so  far  as  they  are  purely  in- 
stinctive, must  obviously  precede  all  others.  Sensa- 
tion, movement,  nutrition  are  the  very  conditions  of 
life,  the  vital  foundation  upon  which  all  higher  life  is 
built  up.  So  long  as  they  exist  alone  (and  they  do  so 
exist  for  some  time),  the  human  creature  is  incapable 
of  conscious  education,  though  by  no  means  insensible 
to  such  treatment  as  may  make  this  education  easier, 
when  higher  faculties  come  into  play.  It  is  only  when 
the  powers  of  sense  perception  begin  to  be  roused  that 
conscious  education  can  be  undertaken,  because  it  is 
only  then  that  there  is  any  intelligent  consciousness  to 
work  upon.  It  is  one  of  the  great  triumphs  of  modern 
psychology  to  have  shown  that  what  is  termed  sense 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  13 

perception  is  not  a  series  of  impressions  made  by  ex- 
ternal things  upon  a  blank,  passive  tablet,  but  that,  in 
so.iaru.'as  it  is  perception,  and  not  merely  sense,  it  is 
the  work  of  the  ordering  or  creating  understanding. 
It  follows  directly  from  this  that,  to  a  very  large  extent, 
every  human  being  creates  his  own  world;  and  since 
his  moral  life  greatly  depends  upon  the  world  he  cre- 
ates and  has  to  live  in,  it  plainly  becomes  the  chief 
function  of  education  to  aid  him  in  creating  such  a 
world  as  may  enable  him  to  live  a  life  of  the- noblest 
kind.  ,  If  it  be  asked  how  education  can  exert  an  influ- 
ence upon  the  creation  of  individual  worlds,  the  answer 
is  that,  since  every  man's  world  is  composed  of  those 
elements  to  which  his  attention  is  chiefly  directed,  and 
by  those  processes  which  are  most  habitual,  and  there- 
fore most  easy,  to  him,  education  may  greatly  influence 
the  creative  process  for  good  by  directing  the  child's 
attention  from  the  first  to  the  nobler  impressions,  and 
habituating  him  to  those  processes  of  mind  which  are 
best  calculated  to  arrange  these  into  an  orderly,  or  per- 
haps we  may  say  at  once  a  rational,  world.  If  the 
"  original  nature  "  of  the  child  be  permitted,  without 
regulation  or  control,  to  create  his  world  for  him,  the 
result  will,  in  the  main,  be  a  world  of  strong  impres- 
sions, arranged  by  the  caprice  of  instinctive  passion, 
counterbalanced  only,  in  the  best  cases,  by  the  dull 
routine  of  tribal  customs.  Such,  indeed,  we  find  to  be 
the  worlds  of  the  members  of  those  savage  tribes  in 
which  "  original  nature  "  is  allowed  to  have  free  play. 
To  obviate  the  creation  of  such  worlds,  it  is  essential 
that  the  higher  faculties  of  the  child — his  intelligence 
and  his  will — be  artificially  called  into  play  from  the 
earliest  possible  moment,  and  made  to  control  his 


14         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

original  nature,  for   the   sake  of  his   ideal   nature.  \ 
This  is  just  what  education  means.     The  ideal  order  \ 
of  development,  therefore,  among  the  human  faculties  / 
differs  from  the  original  one  in  this :  that  whereas,  in .' 
the  latter  the  faculties  of  perception  and  instinct  are 
developed  before  those  of  intellect  and  will,  in  the 
former  they  are  all  developed  simultaneously,  and  in 
such  a  way  that  the  higher  control  the  lower.  .^ 

;^It  will,  of  course,  be  said,  and  justly,  that  the 
process  of  evoking  the  intellect  and  will  of  the  child 
in  such  a  way  that  they  shall  control  his  impressions 
and  instincts  is  a  very  slow  and,  in  many  cases,  a  very 
difficult  one;  but  it  by  no^means  follows  that,  until 
such  time  as  the  process  is  complete,  his  impressions 
and  instincts  are  to  be  left  to  take  care  of  themselves. 
It  is  just  here  that  the  intellect  and  will  of  parents 
come  in  as  substitutes  and  fulfill  their  most  important 
function ;  for,  indeed,  there  is  no  time  at  which  the 
influence  of  parents  is  so  effectual  and  decisive  as  when 
it  is  enabling  the  child,  whose  intelligence  and  will 
are  yet  eij^bryonic,  to  lay  a  worthy  foundation  for  his 
future  world,  by  directing  his  attention  to  the  things 
that  are  fair  and  good,  and  training  his  intellect  to 
note  the  relations  of  these  things.  And  this  is  just 
what  the  Kindergarten,  when  properly  conducted, 
undertakes  to  do. 

We  are  now,  I  trust,  in  a  position  to  sketch,  in  its 
broad  outlines,  the  process  by  which  the  human  being 
is  lifted  out  of  his  original  nature  and  advanced  to  his 
ideal  nature — that  is,  to  trace  the  course  of  a  true 
education. 

When  the  human  creature  comes  into  the  world, 
and  for  some  time  after,  it  is  hardly  more  than  an 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  15 

animal,  with  animal  needs ;  and  as  such  it  has  to  be 
treated.  Indeed,  it  is  the  most  helpless  of  all  young 
animals,  and  requires  the  greatest  amount  of  atten- 
tion. This  attention,  the  first  step  in  education, 
should  be  directed  to  promoting  its  bodily  health  and 
warding  off  such  influences  as  would  interfere  with  its 
normal  growth.  Warmth,  sleep,  and  good  digestion  are 
the  three  principal  things  of  which  it  stands  in  need 
at  this  period,  and  it  needs  them  all  the  more,  if  it  has 
come  into  the  world  weighted,  as  so  many  children  are, 
with  hereditary  weakness.  After  a  few  months  it  be- 
gins to  show  signs  of  intelligence.  It  is  now  proceeding 
to  build  up  its  own  world  "by  means  of  selective  atten- 
tion, and  this  attention  may  be  artificially  directed  and 
prolonged,  so  that  a  rational  world  shall  result.  At  this 
stage  the  aims  of  the  educator  ought  to  be  (1)  to  direct 
the  child's  attention  to  things  on  which  it  is  well  that 
attention  should  rest,  and  which  yield  impressions  fitted 
to  give  a  healthy  fundamental  tone  and  temper  to  the 
whole  character,  and  (2)  to  sustain  that  attention  as 
long  as  possible.  Thus  the  child's  earliest  impressions 
— those  round  which  all  succeeding  ones  cluster,  and  by 
which  they  are  necessarily  colored — will  be  such  as  shall 
not  require  subsequent  removal  or  correction,  and  his 
will  will  receive  a  most  valuable  exercise,  the  only  one 
of  which  at  that  stage  it  is  capable.  It  ought,  indeed, 
never  be  forgotten  that  most  of  the  difficulties  with 
which  education  in  its  later  stages  has  to  contend  are 
due  to  two  causes :  (1)  the  presence  in  the  child's  mind 
of  undesirable  and  chaotic  impressions,  which  have  to 
be  removed  and  corrected  before  an  orderly  world  can 
be  built  up  in  it ;  (2)  the  absence  of  the  power  of  con- 
tinued attention,  or,  which  is  the  same  thing,  the  ab- 
3 


16         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

sence  of  power  of  will.  The  original  nature  of  the 
child,  in  its  pure  fickleness  and  caprice,  demands  a 
continual  change  of  impressions,  and  the  best  way  to 
replace  this  caprice  by  will  is  to  cultivate  prolonged 
attention  to  single  impressions  or  groups  of  impres- 
sions. Nor  must  the  teacher  ever  forget,  what  is  an 
axiom  in  all  education,  that  such  attention  is  best 
secured  by  action.  The  objects,  therefore,  to  which 
the  child's  attention  is  directed  should  be  such  as  he 
can  do  something  about,  not  such  as  he  can  merely 
look  at  or  listen  to.  Moreover,  in  doing  something 
about  things,  he  is  at  once  exercising  his  active  facul- 
ties and  finding  opportunities  for  moral  choice.  The 
utmost  care,  therefore,  ought  to  be  taken  in  selecting 
playthings  and  games  for  him.  These  ought  not  to 
be  numerous.  Two  playthings  are  better  than  twenty ; 
and  one  game  with  a  purpose  is  better  than  fifty  with- 
out. It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  prolonged  atten- 
tion, accompanied  with  action,  being  the  first  exercise 
of  will  on  the  part  of  the  child,  is  the  prime  condition 
of  all  intellectual  and  moral  progress. 

In  selecting  objects  upon  which  to  direct  the  young 
child's  wakening  attention,  the  wise  parent  or  teacher 
will  bear  in  mind  that  the  intellect  has  two  closely 
allied  functions — (1)  to  recognize  distinctions  and  rela- 
tions of  fact,  (2)  to  recognize  distinctions  and  relations 
of  worth.  Bearing  in  mind,  further,  that  the  latter, 
being  essentially  the  moral  faculty,  is  the  more  impor- 
tant of  the  two,  he  will  give  preference  to  such  objects 
and  occupations  as  are  calculated  to  fix  the  child's  at- 
tention not  only  upon  relations  of  fact,  but  also,  and 
still  more,  upon  relations  of  worth.  In  a  word,  he  will 
aim  at  evoking  the  child's  affections,  which  are  his 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  17 

worth-giving  faculties,  in  a  manner  proportioned  to 
the  moral  distinctions  between  things,  and  he  will  do 
this  as  the  best  means  of  directing  his  attention  to  dis- 
tinctions of  fact.  By  thus  enlisting  the  affections  of 
the  child  in  the  interest  of  education,  he  at  once  ob- 
tains two  important  advantages :  (1)  he  comes  into  pos- 
session of  the  key  to  his  will,  and  so  renders  him,  in  the 
main,  his  own  instructor  and  guide ;  and  (2)  he  makes 
his  entire  life  rest  on  a  moral  foundation.  Notwith- 
standing the  extreme  importance  of  this  method,  it  has 
in  the  past  received  but  little  attention,  and  even  at 
the  present  day  it  is  astonishing  to  see  how  little  care 
is  taken  by  parents  and  teachers  to  moralize,  from  the 
first,  the  child's  affections,  and  to  make  them  the  prime 
agents  in  education. 

In  his  Education  of  Cyrus ^  Xenophon  tells  us  that, 
whereas  Greek  boys  went  to  school  to  learn  letters, 
Persian  boys  went  to  learn  justice.  Xenophon,  indeed, 
is  merely  romancing  in  this  case  ;  but  he  does  suggest, 
nevertheless,  an  important  pedagogical  truth(viz.,  that 
during  the  early  years  of  a  child's  life — say  from  the  end 
of  his  second  to  that  of  his  seventh  year — the  chief  aim 
of  education  ought  to  be  to  call  out  and  guide  his  af- 
fections in  accordance  with  the  true  worth  of  things, 
and  to  make  him  recognize  in  his  actions  the  distinc- 
tions thus  established ;  and  this  will  have  to  be  done 
mainly  by  precept,  persuasion,  and  example,  not  by 
any  appeal  to  reason.  While  this  process  is  going  on, 
attention  will  have  to  be  directed  to  physical  culture, 
with  a  view  to  health,  grace,  and  ease  of  movement. 
Sluggishness  and  restlessness  will  alike  be  avoided, 
and  no  attempt  will  be  made  to  cultivate  the  athletic 
habit. 


18         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

In  the  period  following  the  completion  of  the 
child's  seventh  year  (the  epoch  will  differ  somewhat 
for  different  children),  education  will  take  a  new  direc- 
tion. Instruction  will  take  the  place  of  training.  The 
educator  will  now  endeavor  to  acquaint  the  child  with 
the  rational  grounds  for  those  distinctions  and  corre- 
sponding actions  with  which  his  previous  training  has 
made  him  familiar,  and  to  prepare  the  way  for  action 
of  a  wider  scope  based  upon  rational  knowledge.  But 
the  rational  grounds  for  moral  distinctions  are  neither 
more  nor  less  than  the  relations,  or,  w^hich  is  the  same 
thing,  the  laws  of  the  universe.  It  is  therefore  into 
these  that  the  child  must  now.be  gradually  initiated. 
Now,  the  laws  of  the  universe  ale  divided  into  physical 
and  metaphysical  (or  spiritual),  and  this  involves  a 
similar  division  of  studies.         *^ 

But  before  any  study  whatsoever  can  be  success- 
fully carried  forward,  the  child  must  be  taught  to  use 
the  instruments  of  study,  which  may  be  said  to  be 
three :  (1)  language,  (2)  number,  and  (3)  manual  fa- 
cility. Of  course,  he  will  already,  especially  if  he  has 
attended  a  Kindergarten,  be,  to  some  extent,  familiar 
with  all  these.  He  will  be  able  to  talk,  to  perform  the 
simple  arithmetical  processes,  and  perhaps  to  mold 
clay,  braid  straw,  and  do  similar  things.  Now  he  must 
learn  to  read  and  write,  to.perform  the  more  difficult 
arithmetical  operations,  to  draw,  and  to  practice  one  or 
more  of  the  material  arts.*    It  is  due  to  a  stupid  preju- 

*  In  distincruishino^  the  arts  into  material  and  spiritual,  in- 
stead of  into  "  useful "  and  '•  libera]  "  or  "  fine,"  I  know  that  I  am 
departing  from  long-established  usage ;  but  surely  it  is  high  time 
that  we  were  setting  aside  terms  implying  a  view  of  life  which  it 
is  the  aim  of  our  civilization  and  our  education  to  render  obso- 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  19 

dice,  inherited  from  antiquity,  against  these  arts  that 
their  great  educational  value  has  not  been  seen.  This 
value  is  threefold  :  they  impart  (1)  mechanical  skill; 
(2)  a  habit  of  carefulness  and  though tfulness,  closely 
akin  to  conscientiousness;  and  (3)  a  knowledge  of 
the  forms  of  things  and  a  sense  of  the  adaptation  of 
means  to  ends,  such  as  could  hardly  be  obtained  in 
any  other  way.  It  is  needless  to  say  that  drawing  and 
manual  training,  if  properly  taught,  will  form  an  ex- 
cellent introduction  to  the  study  of  art  and  nature. 

As  soon  as  young  people  have  attained  a  mastery 
of  these  instruments  of  study,  they  will  apply  them  to 
the  world  without  and  within  them,  to  obtain  a  knowl- 
edge of  its  laws,  physical  and  metaphysical.  In  order 
to  learn  the  laws  of  their  physical  constitution,  they 
will  direct  their  attention  to  the  natural  sciences,  in 
the  order  of  their  complexity,  beginning  with  those 
which  deal  with  mere  mechanical  forces,  and  gradually 
advancing  toward  those  which  include  instinct  and 
life ;  in  order  to  learn  those  of  their  spiritual  being, 
they  will  study  grammar,  logic,*  aesthetics,  ethics,  and 
religion.     From  the  physical  sciences  they  will  learn 

lete,  as  casting  an  unmerited  and  unbrothering  slur  upon  the 
useful  and  those  engaged  in  the  production  of  it,  and  as  sug- 
gesting that  the  useful  is  illiberal  and  coarse,  and  the  liberal 
and  fine  useless.  All  art  is  useful,  all  art  is  liberal,  all  art  is 
fine,  else  it  has  no  business  to  be  at  all. 

*  The  characteristic  and  fatal  neglect  of  logic  in  modern 
school  education  can  hardly  be  excused  on  the  ground  of  its 
difficulty.  In  reality  it  is  not  more  difficult  than  grammar, 
along  with  which  and  with  rhetoric  it  formed  the  Trivium  of 
the  Middle  Ages.  Even  Luther  recommends  that  "as  soon  as 
boys  are  sufficiently  grounded  in  grammar,  the  hour  previously 
devoted  to  it  shall  be  used  for  logic  and  rhetoric." 


20         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

the  laws  of  sensation — that  is,  of  those  impulses  which 
rouse  the  action  of  reflective  thought,  and  constitute, 
so  to  speak,  its  material ;  from  grammar,  the  nature 
and  use  of  the  means  whereby  thought  expresses  itself 
in  speech ;  from  logic,  the  laws  of  thought  itself ;  from 
aesthetics,  the  laws  determining  the  relative  worth  of 
things  or  beings  for  emotion ;  from  ethics,  the  laws 
governing  the  active  relations  of  finite  beings;  and 
from  religion,  the  laws  governing  the  whole  of  the 
relations  of  finite  rational  beings  to  the  Infinite 
Being. 

After  what  has  been  already  said,  it  will  hardly  be 
necessary  to  insist  that  every  branch  of  study  ought  to 
be  at  once  a  science  and  an  art,  calling  into  play  not 
only  the  passive  and  receptive  faculties,  but  also  the 
active  and  creative  ones.  Even  in  study  it  is  more 
blessed  to  give  than  to  receive.  "  Mere  knowledge," 
in  which  action  and  creation  bear  no  part,  has  always 
been  justly  despised.  It  may,  however,  be  necessary 
to  say  a  few  words  regarding  the  content  of  some  of 
the  above-named  branches  of  study,  especially  of  the 
spiritual  ones.  Under  grammar  I  mean  to  include  all 
linguistic  study — in  a  word,  what  is  often  abusively 
termed  philology ;  under  logic,  not  only  formal  logic, 
so  called,  and  dialectic,  but  also  ideology,  inductive 
logic,  and  the  methodology  of  the  sciences;  under 
aesthetics,  the  theory  and,  to  some  extent,  the  practice 
of  the  spiritual  arts — literary,  musical,  graphic,  and 
plastic;  under  ethics,  not  only  morals,  politics,  and 
economics,  but  also  pedagogics,  social  science,  and  the 
history  of  civilization,  or,  as  it  might  fairly  be  called, 
of  the  ethical  world ;  and  lastly,  under  religion,  the 
laws  of  the  spiritual  sense  and  of  the  world  of  which 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  21 

it  supplies  the  material.  The  theoretical  side  of  re- 
ligion is  theology ;  the  practical,  the  divine  life. 

It  will  be  observed  that  in  the  above  enumeration 
one  science,  which  at  the  present  day  receives  much 
attention,  has  been  omitted — viz.,  psychology.  I  have 
done  this  because,  in  my  opinion,  psychology  is  not  a 
single  science,  but  a  mere  name  for  a  group  of  sciences, 
all  of  which  are  included  in  the  above  list — zoology, 
biology,  physiology,  ideology,  logic,  ethics,  etc. 

The  cycle  of  studies,  thus  completed  and  closed  by 
theology,  constitutes  an  ordered  whole,  corresponding 
to  the  ordered  whole  of  the  universe,  as  far  as  it  is 
known  at  any  given  moment,  and  is  calculated  to  make 
him  who  pursues  it  a  complete  human  being,  harmoni- 
ous inwardly  and  outwardly,  being  related  by  all  his 
powers,  physical  and  spiritual,  to  the  universe  in 
which  he  lives  and  moves  and  has  his  being.  In  a 
word,  it  marks  the  stages  in  the  process  by  which 
man  ascends  from  his  original  to  his  ideal  nature.  In 
saying  this,  however,  we  must  not  fail  to  realize  that 
the  cycle  of  the  sciences  is  never,  in  reality,  completed 
or  closed,  that  everywhere  there  are  large  gaps  in  it. 
The  widest  and  most  regrettable  of  these  is  the  gap 
between  the  spiritual  and  the  natural  sciences.  Here 
so  great  a  gulf  is  fixed  that,  however  firmly  we  may 
believe  that  the  facts  of  spirit  come  under  the  laws  of 
nature,  or  those  of  nature  under  those  of  spirit,  we  are 
utterly  unable  to  see  how  this  is  possible. 

In  the  above  rapid  sketch  of  the  educative  process, 
little  has  been  said  about  physical  training ;  nothing 
about  the  distinction  between  education  and  erudition ; 
and  no  attempt  has  been  made  to  map  out  an  accurate 
plan  of  study  having  regard  to  the  age  of  pupils  and 


A 


EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

the  grade  of  institutions.    We  must  now  briefly  con- 
sider these  points. 

With  regard  to  physical  training,  the  fundamental 
principle  to  be  laid  down  is,  that  its  aim  is  not  to  pro- 
duce athletes,  mountebanks,  or  exquisites,  but  to  ren- 
der the  body  the  ready,  obedient,  supple,  and  effective 
minister  of  the  soul,  at  the  same  time  imparting  to  it 
such  dignity  and  grace  as  shall  make  the  presence  of 
its  owner  at  once  impressive  and  agreeable.  With  a 
view  to  this  end,  four  things — food,  sleep,  warmth,  and 
exercise — require  to  be  regulated  in  accordance  with 
the  different  grades  of  physical  development.  But  a 
good  physical  trainer  will  take  into  account,  not  only 
the  age  of  his  pupils,  but  also  their  temperaments, 
characters,  and  the  entire  round  of  their  daily  activity, 
and  will  so  harmonize  physical  training  with  intel- 
lectual labor  that  the  two  shall  aid,  instead  of  impend- 
ing, each  other.  At  all  periods  of  life  he  will  insist 
upon  a  robust  cleanliness,  having  no  affinity  with  that 
feverish  fastidiousness  which  often  forgets  the  claims 
of  humanity  in  those  of  neatness.  Seeing  that  phys- 
ical training  is  apt  to  develop  a  spirit  of  emulation, 
which  not  unfrequently  degenerates  into  vanity,  arro- 
gance, and  bullying,  he  will  use  every  effort  to  suppress 
this  spirit  and  to  make  his  pupils  feel  that  their  train- 
ing is  meant  to  enable  them,  not  to  triumph  by  bodily 
strength  over  their  fellows,  but  to  raise  their  fellows 
to  all  that  is  great  and  worthy.  He  will  therefore 
continually  remind  them  and — himself  !  that  the  train- 
ing of  nerves  and  of  temper,  which  depends  upon 
nerves,  is  far  more  important  than  the  development 
of  muscle.  In  barbarous  days,  before  brutality  and 
violence  were  checked  by  law,  muscle  was  a  possession 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  2 

of  prime  importance ;  at  present,  it  can  be  little  more 
than  a  minister  to  vanity,  that  vice  which  has  survived 
most  other  manifestations  of  barbarism. 

Between  education  and  erudition  a  clear  line  needs 
to  be  drawn.  Education,  as  we  have  seei/is  the  process 
by  which  a  human  being  is  lifted  out  of  his  original 
into  his  ideal  nature,  and  is  something  which  every 
human  being  ought  to  claim  and  strive  after,  f  Erudi- 
tion, on  the  other  hand,  is  that  special  learning-which 
renders  its  possessor  an  authority,  and  enables  him  to 
become  an  original  investigator,  in  any  special  depart- 
ment of  science.  )It  is  a  specialty  and  generally  a 
preparation  for  a  particular  profession.  A  man  of 
education  at  the  present  day  requires,  for  example, 
to  know  French  and  German  sufficiently  well  to  be 
able  to  read  with  ease  books  WTitten  in  them ;  but  he 
need  not  know  the  entire  history  and  philology  of 
these  languages,  as  Littr6  knew  French,  and  the 
Grimms  German.  So  every  educated  man  must  know 
history  and  biology;  but  he  is  not  bound  to  be  a 
Mommsen  or  a  Darwin.  '  It  is  the  failure  to  draw  this 
necessary  distinction  between  education  and  erudition 
that  is  misleading  our  universities  into  the  error  of 
allowing  students  to  "elect"  specialties  before  they 
have  completed  the  cycle  of  education,  the  result  of 
which  is  that  we  have  few  men  of  thorough  education 
or  of  broad  and  comprehensive  views.  If  this  evil  is 
ever  to  be  remedied,  our  universities  will  be  obliged 
either  to  abandon  this  practice,  or  else  to  give  up  all 
attempt  to  impart  education,  and  devote  themselves 
solely  to  erudition,  leaving  the  other  to  academies, 
gymnasia,  or  the  like. 

And  this  leads  us  to  consider  the  order  in  which 


24         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

the  various  studies  constituting  a  complete  education 
ought  to  be  pursued.  We  can  touch  the  subject  only 
lightly,  and  shall,  for  convenience'  sake,  divide  the 
time  of  education  by  years  and  institutions,  thus : 

First  period,  seven  years,  family  and  Kindergarten.     I 
Second    "       three      "      primary  school.  '  J- 

Third      "       four       "      grammar  school. 

Fourth    "       four        "      high  school,  academy,  or  gymnasium,  jij 
Fifth       "       four        "      university,  with  fixed  curriculum.  ^'^ 

1.  The  first  period  will  be  devoted  mainly  to  the 
development  of  the  physical  and  moral  faculties  of  the 
child  and  of  its  power  of  fixed  attention.  Its  physical 
faculties  will  be  fostered  by  much  sleep,  simple  food 
suited  to  its  years,  and  gentle  activity  taking  the  form 
of  play ;  its  moral  faculties,  by  the  direction  of  its  af- 
fections upon  worthy  things  and  by  habituation  to 
right  actions ;  and  its  power  of  attention,  by  stories 
and  actions  that  terminate  in  a  way  that  can  not  fail 
to  interest.  Xothing  so  much  interests  a  child  as  a 
result  obtained  by  a  process,  especially  a  process  gone 
through  by  itself.  The  education  of  this  p'eriod  will 
be  conducted  almost  entirely  by  the  reason  of  the 
parent  or  teacher,  not  by  that  of  the  child,  whose  chief 
virtues  will  now  be  reverence  and  obedience.  These 
are  the  foundations  of  all  the  virtues. 

2.  The  second  period  wdll  be  occupied  chiefly  with 
learning  the  use  of  the  instruments  of  study — reading, 
writing,  drawing,  arithmetic,  and  manual  facility.  If 
entire  carefulness,  thoroughness,  and  conscientiousness 
be  insisted  on  in  the  acquisition  of  these,  hardly  any  . 
other  special  training  will  be  required  to  keep  the 
moral  faculties  in  a  healthy  condition.  A  child  who 
does  honest  work,  and  sees  the  result  of  it,  can  hardly. 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  f  J 

fail  at  once  to  obtain  an  oracle  of  approval  from  his 
own  conscience,  and  to  see  the  rationality  of  well- 
doing. In  this  way  he  gradually  comes  to  be  his  own 
moral  director,  and  so  to  be  a  free  being. 

3.  The  task  of  the  third  period  will  be  to  make  the 
growing  boy  and  girl  familiar  with  their  own  mental 
processes — intellectual,  aesthetic,  and  moral — and  to 
give  them  general  notions  of  the  world  in  which  they 
live.  Grammar,  logic,  the  first  principles  of  aesthetics 
and  ethics ;  astronomy  (involving  geometry  and  mechan- 
ics), physical  and  political  geography,  and  the  outlines 
of  history,  enlivened  by  biographies  of  great  men,  will 
form  the  chief  subjects  of  study.  In  connection  with 
the  first  four  subjects  a  good  deal  of  reading  in  prose 
and  poetry  will  be  done,  and  many  literary  gems  com- 
mitted to  memory.  The  years  from  ten  to  fourteen 
being  those  in  which  the  memory  is  most  retentive, 
the  opportunity  ought  to  be  seized  for  storing  it  with 
the  best  and  best-expressed  thought  of  all  the  ages. 
It  is  not  necessary  that  the  whole  of  it  should  be  at 
once;  understood  ;  lodged  in  the  memory,  it  may  safely 
be  left  to  germinate  and  grow,  as  the  experience  of 
life  gives  it  meaning,  by  furnishing  concrete  illustra- 
tions of  it.  Now  also  is  the  time  for  committing  to 
memory  the  paradigms  of  those  languages  an  acquaint- 
ance with  which  forms  an  essential  means  to  a  com- 
plete education — Greek,  Latin,  German,  etc.  Physical 
training  will  now  take  the  form  of  regular  gymnastics 
{Tur7ien),  supplemented  by  swimming,  riding,  vigor- 
ous games,  dancing,  and  some  such  manual  labor  as 
wood- chopping,  carpentering,  gardening,  etc.  This 
may  seem  a  large  programme  for  such  tender  years ; 
^nf  pxperience  will  show  that  it  may  be  successfully 


2^ 


EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 


carried  out,  if  every  waking  hour  is  filled,  as  it  ought 
to  be,  with  aimful,  rational  work.  Nothing  is  more 
fatal  at  this  age  than  aimless  action  and  listless  loung- 
ing. They  are  the  parents  of  mischief  and  wayward- 
ness. 

4.  The  fourth  or  high-school  period  is,  for  many 
reasons,  the  most  difficult  to  deal  with.  It  is  the  pe- 
riod in  which  the  transition  is  made  from  boyhood  and 
girlhood  to  manhood  and  womanhood,  when  new  feel- 
ings and  interests  are  awakened  and  come  with  a  kind 
of  surprise,  when  both  youth  and  maiden  find  them- 
selves in  a  new  world,  for  which  their  previous  train- 
ing and  habits  have  hardly  prepared  them,  and  in 
which,  therefore,  they  are  most  liable  to  go  astray, 
unless  proper  precaution  be  taken.  The  leading  char- 
acteristic of  all  the  studies  of  this  period  should  be 
vigor,  calling  for  a  strong  exercise  of  will,  and  a  good 
deal  of  energetic  emotion.  Geology,  chemistry,  botany, 
and  zoology,  involving  considerable  outdoor  life,  are 
now  in  order  ;  so  is  history — political,  social,  and  eco- 
nomic— with  its  heart-stirring  heroisms  and  pathos 
and  its  noble  examples  of  manliness  and  womanliness, 
of  tenderness  and  generosity.  Now  is  the  time  to  read 
the  great  epics,  dramas,  and  orations  of  the  world,  and 
to  commit  the  best  parts  of  them  to  memory ;  now  the 
time  to  form  an  acquaintance  with  the  great  works  of 
sculpture  and  painting  ;  now  the  time  to  give  the  im- 
agination free  scope  by  reading  and  rereading  the 
works  of  Sir  Walter  Scott ;  now  the  time  for  such 
physical  exercises  and  games  as  demand  courage, 
endurance,  and  patience,  and  at  the  same  time  give 
ample  opportunity  for  exercising  the  sense  of  jus- 
tice. 


NATURE  AND  EDUCATION.  27 

5.  The  chief  aim  of  the  studies  of  the  fifth  period 
will  be  to  round  off  into  an  harmonious  and  consistent 
view  of  the  world  all  that  has  gone  before,  and  so  pre- 
pare the  young  man  and  woman  to  enter  upon  life  as 
upon  a  rational  task,  to  be  undertaken  for  rational 
ends.  The  leading  characteristic  of  the  occupations 
of  this  period  will  be  comprehensiveness,  calling  for 
quiet,  steady  reflection  and  calm,  dignified  action. 
Biology,  the  higher  problems  of  ethics,  sociology  and 
politics,  theology  and  the  history  of  religion,  psychol- 
ogy, epistemology,  and  the  various  systems  of  specu- 
lative philosophy  will  now  be  studied.  The  chief 
works  on  evolution,  the  sacred  books  of  the  great  re- 
ligions, the  masterpieces  of  Plato,  Aristotle,  the  great 
Schoolmen,  Descartes,  Spinoza,  Locke,  Hume,  Leib- 
nitz, Reid,  Kant,  Hegel,  and  Rosmini ;  the  writings  of 
the  great  poet  philosophers — the  Oresteia^  the  De  Re- 
ru7u  Natiira^  the  Divine  Comedy^  Faust,  In  Memoriam 
— will  be  read  and  carefully  discussed.  Now  will  be 
cultivated  the  power  of  orderly,  forcible,  and  perspicu- 
ous writing  and  speaking,  and  that  modesty  com- 
bined with  confidence  which  makes  both  effective. 
Physical  exercise  will  now  consist  mainly  of  walking, 
riding,  swimming,  rowing,  and  light  gymnastics.  Vio- 
lent exercise  will  gradually  be  discarded,  and  quiet 
endurance,  more  than  spasmodic  strength,  be  culti- 
vated. In  the  sphere  of  morals  and  religion  every 
means  will  be  used  to  make  the  young  man  and  young 
woman  feel,  see,  and  by  action  prove,  that  the  world 
is  God's  home,  mankind  His  family,  and  He  the  in- 
bjiite,  loving  Father.  Thus  will  arise  that  persistent 
cltitude  of  love  and  worship  which  alone  confers  con- 
secration and  blessedness  on  life,  which  alone  gives 

\ 


28         EDUCATION  OF  TBE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

man  the  right  to  say  that  he  is  educated,  that  he  has 
conquered  his  original  nature,  and  risen  to  his  ideal 
nature.  A  divine  world  will  now  have  been  created 
in  the  individual  soul,  and  therein  life  will  be  truly 
aimf ul  and  blessed,  because  it  is  the  life  of  God. 


31 


'ij^-*^    09  THE         ^ 
'UKIVBII2IT7; 


CHAPTER  11. 

GEEEK   LIFE   AN'D   ITS    IDEALS. 

The  outline  of  a  program  of  education  given  in  the 
last  chapter  was  meant  to  furnish  us  with  a  standard 
whereby  to  estimate  the  educational  system  of  the 
Greeks.  Therein  we  sought  to  show  that  the  aim  ^pl. 
education  is  to  lift  the  human  being  out  of  his  "origi- 
nal nature"  into  his  " ideal  nature,"  which  consists... pf 
intelli^nce,  affection,  and  will,  haxmoniaaaly  working 
together  for  their  own  pericction  ;  and  we  concliuled 
that  the  best  education  is  that  which  best  accomplishes 
this  object. 

Before  proceeding  further,  we  may  do  well  to  dwell 
for  a  moment  longer  on  this  fundamental  point.  Man, 
as  a  rational  being,  is  his  own  end.  The  aim  of  his 
life  is  the  realization  or  manifestation  of  himself,  and 
to  this  aim  all  things,  all  art,  all  science,  nay,  the  world 
itself,  are  subservient.  This  self-manifestation  forms 
a  triunity  of  intelligence,  Section,  will ;  and  it  is  on 
the  scale  of  this  triunity  that  all  human  worth,  wliether 
in  "individuals,  nations,  or  epochs,  is  measured.  Ilf  we 
teisli'  to  know  where  an  individual  stands  in  the  scale 
hy  worth  (aperrj),  we  have  only  to  find  out  how  much  in- 
ccJlligence,  how  much  love,s  sympathy,  or  affection,  how 
stluch  will  he  possesses,  and  how  harmofiie^usly  these 


A 


28      ^^^^Jation  of  the  greek  people. 

™^^  Ilended^  And  the  same  thing  is  true  of  nations 
%nd  epochs.  .  God  himself  can  mean  to  us  nothing 
more,  and  nothing  less,  than  the  complete  and~Bar- 
monious  realization  of  intelligence,  love,  and  will ;  for 
these  are  the  constituent  elements  of  true  being,  of 
which  He  is  the  plenitude. 

These  considerations  suggest  a  curious  and  some- 
what paradoxical  result,  viz.,  that  a  man's  sola.^nd 
only  possible  duty  in  this  world  is  to  realize  himself ; 
in  other  words,  to  manifest  in  himself  the  divine  im- 
age, the  plenitude  of  being.  At  the  first  glance,  this 
seems  to  mean  that  a  man's  sole  concern  is  with  him- 
self and  his  own  "  culture,"  and  that  he  can  well  afford 
to  neglect  the  rest  of  the  world,  or  to  use  it  merely  as 
means.  But  a  moment's  reflection  will  show  that  the 
truth  is  far  otherwise.  For  how  can  a  man  manifest 
intelligence  except  by  knowing  the  world,  man,~and 
God  ;  or  love,  except  by  loving  these ;  or  will,  except 
by  serving  these?  It  follows  that  the  individual  can 
realize  himself  only  by  knowing,  loving,  and  serving 
the  world,  man,  and  God.  Moreover,  since  the  end  of 
life  is  the  realization  of  the  divine  plenitude,  it.is~this 
that  sets  the  standard  of  duty,  this  that  furnishes  its 
sanction.'  in  a  word,  all  duty  is  primarily  and  directly 
duty  to  God.  Man's  duty  to  man  is  but  secondary  and 
indirect.  It  is  this  fact  that  imparts  to  duty  its  dig- 
nity, lifting  it  out  of  the  spasmodic  currents  of  senti- 
ment and  the  beggarly  arithmetic  of  prudence,  and 
making  it  the  expression  of  the  divine  wii>.which 
neither  hastes  nor  rests. 

The  fact  that  man  can  attain  his  end  only  throi\ 
knowing,  loving,  and  serving  God  and  his  fellJ 
forms  the  reason  why  he  creates  institutions — wh'^j ' 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  31 

is,  as  Aristotle  said,  "a  political  animal."  Institu- 
tions are  means  whereby  men  are  enabled  to  know, 
love,  and  serve  God  and  their  fellows  better,  and  are 
valuable  just  in  proportion  as  they  accomplish  this. 
Here,  then,  we  have  a  standard  for  measuring  the 
worth  of  institutions. 

With  these  standards  for  moral  worth,  for  duty, 
and  for  institutions  in  our  minds,  we  may  perhaps  ap- 
proach Greek  education  with  some  hope  of  forming  a 
true  estimate  of  it.  But,  before  we  can  do  this,  we 
must  be  able  to  form  a  clear  conception  of  what  that 
education  was,  in  what  condition  it  found  its  subjects, 
and  what  it  undertook  to  do  for  them.  This  will  com- 
pel us  to  consider  Greek  Life  and  its  Ideals,  which,  ac- 
cordingly, will  form  the  subject  of  this  chapter. 

During  the  period  in  which  the  Greeks  had  any- 
thing that  could  fairly  be  called  an  educational  sys- 
tem, as  distinguished  from  the  training  afforded  by 
experience,  their  life  centered  in,  and  revolved  round, 
a  single  institution,  which,  for  want  of  a  better  term, 
we  may  call  the  city-state  (iroAts).  This,  the  highest 
political  achievement  of  Greek  genius,  was  the  crown 
of  a  long  process,  the  various  epochs  in  which  were 
marked  by  institutions  of  lower  grade.  These  the 
city-state  absorbed,  modified,  and  subordinated,  so  that 
they  became  its  organs.  In  order,  then,  to  understand 
Greek  life  and  its  ideals,  we  must  consider  this  insti- 
tution and  these  organs. 

Aristotle,  in  the  opening  chapter  of  his  Politics^ 
tells  us  that  the  steps  in  political  evolution  are  marked 
by  (1)  the  household  (oTkos,  otKta,  yeVos),  (2)  the  village 
community  or  township  (Kw/xry,  3^/xos),  and  (3)  the  city- 
state  (ttoAis)  ;  and  he  goes  on  to  say  that  the  first  aims 
4 


32         EDUCATION  OP  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

at  securing  the  natural  and  daily  necessities  of  life ; 
the  second,  at  providing  for  the  more  permanent  ma- 
terial goods ;  the  third,  at  making  possible  independ- 
ence or  freedom  and  a  virtuous  life,  wherein  true  man- 
hood consists.  In  making  this  classification,  Aristotle 
is  taking  into  account  the  constitution  of  society  as  he 
finds  it  about  him,  rather  than  the  growth  of  institu- 
tions as  historic  inquiry  reveals  it.  Indeed,  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  latter  was  beyond  his  reach.  He  accord- 
ingly fails  to  distinguish  between  the  institutions 
whose  ^succession  paves  the  way  for  the  city-state  and 
the  later  modifications  of  these  that  arise  through  the 
reaction  of  the  same. 

Historical  research  shows  us  that  the  earliest  of 
human  associations  is,  indeed,  the  household — not, 
however,  the  household  as  we  understand  it,  but  the 
patriarchal  family,  consisting  of  persons  related,  or 
supposed  to  be  related,  to  each  other  by  blood,  and 
governed  by  its  oldest  member.  On  the  other  hand, 
it  shows  us  that  this  is  not  something  prior  to  and 
different  from  the  village  community,  but  something 
identical  with  it,  at  least  among  peoples  who  have 
passed  from  the  nomadic,  to  the  settled,  mode  of  life. 
Now,  one  most  important  fact  about  the  patriarchal 
family  is,  that  it  is,  above  all,  a  religious  community, 
held  together  by;  religious  ties.  In  saying  that  it  is 
held  together  by  blood-ties,  and  again  by  religious  ties, 
we  are  not  making  inconsistent  or  contradictory  state- 
ments :  the  blood-ties  are  religious  ties,  and  ail  reli- 
gious ties  are  originally  blood-ties.  This  is  a  fact 
fraught  with  such  momentous  and  all-pervasive  re- 
sults that  we  must  dwell  upon  it  at  some  length. 

The  patriarchal  family  consists  of  two  main  divi- 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  33 

sions :  (1)  its  human  members,  (2)  its  brute  mem- 
bers ;  and  the  former  of  these  is  again  subdivided 
into  two :  {a)  living  members,  (b)  dead  members.  All 
these  are  held  together  by  what  may  be  called,  indif- 
ferently, a  blood- tie  or  a  life-tie.  In  a  word,  the  whole 
family  is  supposed  to  be  instinct  with  a  common  life 
or  blood,  and,  since  it  is  upon  the  vigor  of  this  life 
that  the  well-being  of  the  whole  and  of  the  parts  de- 
pends, every  effort  is  made  to  strengthen  it.  Withj 
this  view,  from  time  to  time  a  member  of  the  family ,j 
usually  a  brute  member,  is  put  to  death,  and  its  fleshj 
partaken  of  by  all  the  human  members,  living  and 
dead.  Such  is  the  origin  of  sacrifice,  whose  original 
purpose  was  to  bind  together  into  a  strong,  saving 
unity  of  life  all  the  members,  visible  and  invisible, 
of  a  family.  The  portion  assigned  to  the  latter  was 
either  poured,  in  the  form  of  blood,  upon  the  stone  in 
which  they  were  supposed  to  reside,  or  burned  upon 
it  in  the  shape  of  flesh  or  fat,  so  that  they  might  in- 
hale it  in  the  form  of  vapor.  Such  is  the  origin  of 
the  altar,  which  was  originally  nothing  else  than  a 
stone  in  which  the  life  of  an  ancestor  was  supposed 
to  reside,  and  on  which,  therefore,  his  share  of  the  sac- 
rificial meal  was  placed  in  such  a  form  that  he  could 
enjoy  it.*    And  this  brings  vividly  before  us  the  no- 

*  Of  course,  a  share  in  the  sacrificial  meal  was  not  the  only 
thing  that  the  invisible  members  of  the  household  received.  A 
portion  of  everything  that  was  eaten  or  drunk  was  presented 
to  them  ;  but  a  clear  distinction  was  always  drawn  between  sac- 
rifices and  offerings,  at  least  among  the  Aryan  and  Semitic 
peoples.  Among  the  Hebrews  the  distinction  was  felt  to  be  so 
great  that  Abel,  who  offered  a  sacrifice,  was  said  to  have  been 
accepted  by  God,  while  Cain,  who  presented  an  offering,  was  re- 


34         EDUCATION  OF  ^RB  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

tions  entertained  by  those  primitive  households  with 
regard  to  the  abode  and  the  mode  of  life  of  their  de- 
parted ancestors.  It  was  supposed  not  only  that  these 
were  still  present  with  the  household,  and  that  they 
were  deeply  interested  in  its  affairs,  but  also  that  its 
welfare  depended  largely  upon  their  favor,  and  their 
happiness  upon  the  actions  and  fortunes  of  its  living 
members.*  It  is  very  difiBcult  for  us  in  these  days  to 
enter  into  such  a  conception  of  life  and  its  relations 
as  this;  but,  unless  we  do,  so, we  shall  utterly  fail  to 
understand  not  only  ancient  Greek  life  and  education, 
but  also  the  whole  life  of  the  ancient  world.  That  life 
was,  to  its  very  core,  permeated  with  religion,  that 
is,  with  a  sense  of  dependence  upon  a  unity  of  life 
with  the  invisible  lives   of  departed  ancestors.      To 

jected  (see  Heb.  xi,  4,  and  cf.  Gen.  iv,  4) ;  and  indeed  it  is  fre- 
quently referred  to  in  both  the  Old  and  New  Testaments  (see 
Psalms,  xl,  6  ;  Heb.  v,  1 ;  viii,  3 ;  ix,  9).     In  a  fragment  of  ^s- 
chylus  (156,  Dind.),  we  find  the  same  distinction  made : 
"  Alone  of  all  the  gods,  Death  loves  not  gifts  ; 
Nay,  nor  with  sacrifice  nor  drink  poured  out 
Canst  thou  accomplish  aught  with  him." 
It  is  a  curious  and  significant  fact  that  the  sacrifice  of  Christ, 
as  viewed  in  Christian  theology,  accomplishes  precisely  what  the 
very  earliest  sacrifices  were  supposed  to  do  :  it  binds  men  into 
unity  with  each  other  and  with  their  invisible  Father.     If  sin 
be  regarded  as  a  falling  away  from  this  unity,  we  can  easily 
understand  that  "it  is  the  blood  that  raaketh  atonement  by 
reason  of  the  life"  (Lev.  xvii,  11),  and  that  "apart  from  shed- 
ding of  blood  there  is  no  remission  "  (Heb.  ix,  22). 

*  This  early  belief  in  the  presence  of  deceased  ancestors  in 
the  living  household  finds  a  striking  illustration  in  the  tombs 
of  ancient  Etruria.  These  are  fitted  up  exactly  like  the  houses 
of  the  living,  with  every  convenience  for  a  comfortable,  or  even 
luxurious,  existence. 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  35 

maintain  this  unity  was  the  supreme  end  of  life,  de- 
termining all  action  and  all  abstention  from  action. 
Kemembering  that  these  ghostly  ancestors  were  the 
earliest  gods,*  we  may  say  that  the  primitive  house- 
hold consisted  of  gods,  men,  and  animals,  bound  to- 
gether by  a  common  life,  and  that  its  weal  was  con- 
ceived to  depend  upon  the  perfect  integrity  of  this 
life.  When  a  man  died,  his  life  was  supposed  to  pass 
from  his  body,  with  which  it  had  merely  an  accidental 
connection,  into  something  else  more  durable — a  stone, 
a  rock,  a  tree,  a  spring,  which  then  became  at  once 
sacred  (kadosli^  Upd,  sacra,  taboo).  This,  indeed,  is 
the  very  meaning  of  "  sacred."  The  actions  performed 
by  the  living  household  with  reference  to  these  sacred 
objects  constituted  worship,  whose  sole  aim  was  to  pre- 
serve and  strengthen  the  life  of  the  whole. 

We  can  now  see  how  not  only  the  vegetable  but 
also  the  mineral  world  came  to  be  regarded  as  sharing 
in  the  life  of  the  household,  and  therefore  as  claiming 
an  interest  or  respect  quite  different  from  that  due  to 
their  material  usefulness.  We  can  also  see  how  re- 
ligion, in  its  earliest  stages,  assumed  the  forms  of 
fetichism  and  animism,  and  how  the  feeling  that  a 
common  life  animated  the  entire  household,  with  its 
animal,  vegetable,  and  mineral  surroundings,  would, 
in  course  of  time,  develop  into  pantheism.     But  this 

*  There  is  much  discussion  at  the  present  day  as  to  whether 
the  earliest  gods  were  ghosts  of  ancestors  or  powers  of  nature 
personified.  The  question  is  really  a  vain  one,  since  it  credits 
primitive  men  with  conceptions  and  distinctions  to  which  they 
were  entire  strangers.  The  earliest  gods  were  both  ghosts  and 
powers  of  nature,  in  this  sense,  that  the  powers  of  nature  were 
conceived  as  being  of  the  same  nature  as  the  life  in  man. 


36         EDUCATIOX  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

was  a  late  result,  possible  only  when  men  had  arrived 
at  a  conception  of  the  whole,  or  universe  (to  -n-av).  The 
interests  of  primitive  men  were  much  narrower,  being 
confined  entirely  to  the  household.  What  shared  in 
its  life  or  blood  they  regarded  with  sympathy  ;  every- 
thing else  with  antipathy.  "  Friend  "  and  "  foe " 
meant  originally  kindred  and  alien.* 

But  the  notion  that  the  blood-tie  could  be  strength- 
ened by  participation  in  the  life  of  a  sacrificed  animal 
easily  passed  into  the  notion  that  it  might  be  created 
by  the  same  means.  This  paved  the  way,  not  only  for 
the  admission  of  members  of  one  household  into  an- 
other, but  even  for  the  union  of  two  or  more  entire 
households,  a  thing  which  the  need  of  self-defence 
must  often  have  suggested  and  rendered  necessary. 
But  the  union  of  two  households  meant,  not  merely 
the  coalescence  of  their  living  members  into  a  new 
social  whole,  but  also  and  primarily  an  alliance  of 
their  invisible  members  and  a  conjunction  of  the  acts 
of  worship  performed  to  them ;  it  meant,  in  a  word, 
the  union  of  two  religions.  But,  inasmuch  as  the  di- 
vinities of  each 'household  were  attached  to  certain 
objects  and  localities,  this  would  have  been  a  matter 
of  considerable  diflBculty,  had  there  been  no  new  con- 
ception to  help  it  out  But  such  a  conception  there 
was.      The   notion    that    particular   objects,   stones, 

*  It  is  easy  to  see  how  from  the  word  freo,  signif ving  to  re- 
fford  as  kin,  should  come  the  words  friend,  fres ;  A.  S.  fren 
and  freo  (honored  man  and  woman,  lord  and  lady;  cf.  Arab. 
sahib,  meaning  both  friend  and  lord) ;  Ger.,  froh,  frohlich 
(merry),  etc. ;  and  how  from  feo  (feog),  to  regard  as  an  alien, 
we  should  g:et  foe,  fiend,  feud ;  Scot.,  fey  (doomed  to  death  ;  IsL, 
feigr) ;  Ger.,  fei^  (cowardly),  faugh ;  Scot,  feech,  etc 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  37 

trees,  springs,  etc.,  were  endowed  witli  Ijfe  naturally 
widened  out  into  the  notion  that  each  department  of 
visible  nature  was  so  endowed,  a  process  which  would 
be  greatly  hastened  in  cases  where  families  were  forced 
to  leave  their  old  homes,  and  therewith  the  objects  of 
worship  supposed  to  be  animated  by  the  lives  of  their 
ancestors.  Instead,  now,  of  worshiping  the  particular 
rock  or  stone,  they  worshiped  a  mountain,  or  even  the 
earth  owned  by  them ;  instead  of  the  particular  tree, 
all  trees,  whole  groves,  or  even  the  expanse  of  heaven ; 
instead  of  the  particular  spring,  all  springs,  streams, 
and  finally  all  water.*  In  this  way  ancestor-worship 
passed,  in  the  most  natural  way,  into  nature-worship. 

Thus  the  advance  from  ancestor-worship  to  nature- 
worship  corresponds  to  an  advance  in  social  develop- 
ment—an advance  from  the  village  community  to  what 
the  Greeks  called  a  phratry  {(fypdrpa  or  (fyparpLa),  the 
Latins  a  cima^  and  the  Germans  a  hundred.  The 
process  was  a  slow  one,  and  in  neither  case  did  the 
new  supersede  the  old  ;  it  was  merely  superimposed 

*  In  the  Rig  -  Veda  (vii,  34, 23)  we  read  :  "  May  the  mountains, 
the  waters,  the  generous  plants,  and  heaven,  may  the  earth  with 
the  trees,  and  the  two  worlds,  protect  our  wealth ! "  In  the 
Avesta  (Yasna,  Ixviii,  3)  we  read  :  "  We  sacrifice  to  the  sea 
Vouru-Kasha,  and  to  all  waters  upon  earth,  whether  standing 
or  running,  or  waters  of  the  well,  or  spring  waters  which  peren- 
nially flow,  or  the  drippings  of  the  rains,  or  the  irrigations  of 
canals."  How  easily  the  notion  of  an  overarching  tree  passed 
into  that  of  the  overarching  heaven,  may  be  seen  in  the  case  of 
the  Zoroastrian  Haryisptokhm  (see  Sacred  Books  of  the  East, 
vol.  iv,  p.  54,  n.  2),  in  the  Norse  Yggdrasil  (see  Simrock,  Hand- 
huch  der  deutschen  Jlythologie,  pp.  32  sqq.),  and  in  such  Greek 
phrases  as  S^vSpea  ovpavofi'fiKea  (Herod.,  ii,  138),  i\dr7j5  ovpdviov 
aKpou  K\d5ov  (Eurip.,  Bacch.,  1064). 


38         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

upon  it.  While  the  ancestor-worships  remained  the 
religions  of  the  households  composing  the  phratry, 
nature-worship  became  the  religion  of  the  phratry  in 
its  corporate  capacity.  This  change  was  a  most  im- 
portant one  for  civilization,  involving  far-reaching 
consequences.  Previously,  all  worship  had  been  a 
family  matter,  conducted  by  the  family-head  or  pa- 
triarch, at  the  family  shrines,  that  is,  near  the  objects 
supposed  to  be  arimated  by  the  lives  of  their  ances- 
tors. JSiow,  it  became  a  public  matter,  conducted  at 
the  common  meeting  place  of  the  households,  by  a  per-- 
son  specially  chosen  for  the  purpose,  in  honor  of  beings 
attached  to  no  special  material  objects,  but  present  in 
large  portions  of  nature.  The  meeting-place  now  as- 
sumed a  sacred  character — became,  in  fact,  a  temple 
(tc/acvos,  Upov)  ;  the  new  official  was  a  priest  {Upevs) ; 
the  new  worship  expressed  the  new  unity  by  relating 
the  participating  households  to  common  ancestors 
older  than  those  worshiped  by  them  separately.  As 
to  the  last  fact,  it  was  but  natural  that  the  new  social 
union  should  seem  possible  only  as  representing  the 
recovery  of  long-forgotten  blood-ties;  for  in  those 
days  all  friendly  relations  were  conceived  as  blood- 
relations,  as  indeed  they  are  still  among  peoples  in  the 
village-community  stage  of  culture.  The  new  union 
took  a  name  generally,  though  not  always,  plural  in 
form.  The  singular  of  this  was  looked  upon  as  the 
name  of  the  founder  of  the  community,  who  was  now 
represented  as  the  son  of  the  divinity  selected  as  the 
patron  of  that  community. 

In  this  new  social  union  we  find  the  beginnings  of 
many  things  that  afterward  assumed  momentous  pro- 
portions— e.  g.,  (1)  of  the  separation  of  patriarchal  and 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  39 

priestly  functions  ;  *  (2)  of  public  worship ;  (3)  of  the 
belief  that  men  sprang  from  nature-divinities ;  (4)  of 
social,  as  distinct  from  household  duties  and  relations ; 
(5)  of  the  substitution  of  a  land-bond  for  the  blood- 
bond,  as  the  principle  of  social  union.  In  this  widen- 
ing of  life  the  important  thing  to  observe  is,  that  life 
remained  essentially  religious,  that  the  new  social  uni- 
ties were  religious  associations.  Through  the  gradual 
superposition  of  the  land-bond,  1^  Dwever,  upon  the 
blood-bond,  social  religion  came  to  be  connected  with 
territorial  limits  instead  of  with  blood-relationship. f 
Hence  we  frequently  find  divinities  named  after  dis- 
tricts— e.  g.,  Artemis  Munychia,  Artemis  Brauronia 
(who  had  a  temple  on  the  Athenian  acropolis),  etc. 
Hence  also  we  find  growing  up  alongside  the  sense 
of  family  or  kin  the  sense  of  country  or  fatherland 

*  This,  which  was  the  germ  of  the  separation  between  Church 
and  State,  seems  to  have  taken  place  in  Greece  and  Latiuin  very 
early,  so  that  the  priests  never  formed  a  ruling  class  possessing 
civil  power.  It  was  otherwise  among  the  Hebrews,  with  whom 
the  priests  formed  a  kind  of  caste,  which  at  all  times  exercised 
great  social  influence,  and  in  the  end  absorbed  all  political 
power.  Their  ideal  was  a  "  kingdom  of  priests  "  (Exod.  xix,  G). 
It  is  curious  to  find  that  Moses,  when  he  unites  the  households 
of  his  people,  finds  it  necessary  to  cement  that  union  by  the 
sanction  of  a  new  divinity,  Jahweh,  who  has  appeared  to  him  in 
a  burning  bush.  This  divinity  at  once  takes  a  position  above 
the  old  Elohim  or  household  divinities,  who  soon  lose  their  indi- 
vidualities and  sink  into  a  being  who  seems  indifferent  as  to 
number,  and  is  ultimately  identified  with  Jahweh.  See  the  cu- 
rious passage  in  Gen.  xviii,  where  Jahweh  appears  to  Abraham 
as  three  men  ! 

f  This  relation  of  a  god  to  the  land  was  expressed  in  Hebrew 
by  the  word  Baal.  See  Robertson  Smith,  Relig.  of  the  Semites, 
p.  93. 


40        EDCrCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

(Trarpts,  irarph  yata),  and  the  notion  that  membership 
in  the  society  held  together  by  that  bond  involves  pos- 
session of  a  share  in  that  land.  It  was  on  the  basis  of 
this  notion  that  there  came  to  be  introduced  that  dis- 
tinction, so  important  in  its  consequences,  between 
nobles,  or  possessors,  and  commons,  or  non-possessors 
— between  eorlas  and  ceorlas,  as  the  old  English  said. 

How  this  came  about  seems  clear  enough.  As  the 
sense  of  the  land-bond  strengthened,  that  of  the  blood- 
bond  proportionately  weakened,  so  that  the  old  patri- 
archal families,  though  still  acknowledging  a  blood- 
connection,  and  giving  it  expression  in  sacrifices, 
gradually  broke  up  into  monogamic  households  in 
the  modern  sense,  which  stood  in  direct  relation  to  the 
phratry.  At  the  same  time  the  land  which  had  pre- 
viously been  held  in  common  by  the  members  of  the 
patriarchal  families  was  gradually  broken  up  into  lots, 
which  became  the  private  property  of  the  new  house- 
holds. ^  Thus  private  property  in  land  and  the  mono- 
gamic family  have  their  origin  in  the  same  social  change. 
But  in  course  of  time,  as  families  multiplied,  without 
any  corresponding  increase  of  territory,  a  certain  num- 
ber of  them  were  forced  to  go  without  land  and  betake 
themselves  to  handicrafts,  fishing,  and  the  like.  But 
as  membership  in  the  phratry  had  come  to  be  regarded 
as  depending  upon  possession  of  land,  these  landless 
families  occupied  an  inferior  position,  becoming  in 
fact  dependent  upon  the  landed  proprietors.  Thus 
society  was  divided  up  into  two  classes,  whose  interests 
were  not  always  found  to  coincide — classes  which  we 
may  term  nobles  (evycvcts)  and  commons  (dyevets). 

But  inasmuch  as  a  superior  class  has  always  diffi- 
culty in  maintaining  its  privileges,  it  was  natural  that 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  ^3 

the  nobles  should  combine  in  order  to  maintain  theirs. 
In  doing  this  they  founded  the  third  political  institu- 
tion, the  city-state,  which  was  originally  nothing  more 
than  a  stronghold  of  nobles  with  their  dependents, 
making  common  cause  to  hold  in  subjection  the  less 
privileged  class.  The  better  to  accomplish  their  pur- 
pose, they  chose  a  head  or  king,  surrounded  their 
stronghold  with  walls,  and  chose  gods  to  cement  their 
union.*  And  what  is  the  principle  of  this  union? 
We  have  seen  that  in  the  family  the  bond  was  blood, 
in  the  phratry  or  hundred,  land.  In  the  city-state  it 
was  nobility,  which,  though  originally  based  upon 
property  in  land,  came,  in  course  of  time,  to  imply  a 
good  deal  more.  Aristotle  rightly  defines  "  nobility  " 
as  "  ancient  wealth  and  worth  "  (y  yap  evyiveta,  cVriv 
apxalosiTrXovTo^  kol  aperrj,  PoUt.,  iv,  8) ;  and  the  worth 
came  finally  to  be  the  more  important  element. 

With  the  establishment  of  the  city,  an  enormous 
change  took  place  in  the  relations  of  society.  A  clear 
line  was  now  drawn  between  gentle  and  simple,  be- 
tween citizens  and  rustics  (TroXtrat  and  Srjfxorat).  There 
now  came  into  existence  a  leisure-class  which  regarded 
itself  as  having  no  duties  except  to  govern  the  other 
.classes  and  cultivate  worth  (dperiy),  a  term  which, 
though  it  connoted  different  things  at  different  times, 
always  denoted  those  qualities  which  enable  a  man  to 
govern.  The  ground  was  now  prepared  in  which  the 
higher  manifestations  of  humanity — art,  science,  phi- 
losophy, statesmanship,  ethical  religion — might  grow 

*  Such  gods  were  called  iroXiovxoi ;  cf.  ttoKkilis,  TroXids,  etc. 
It  is  curious  to  find  tha,t  these  epithets,  like  ippdTpios,  are  confined 
to  Zeus  and  Athena. 


40        EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

tind  flourish ;  for,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  these  are 
well-nigh  impossible  without  a  class  of  men  which 
manages  to  have  its  material  wants  supplied  by  an- 
other class.  But,  in  spite  of  these  momentous  changes, 
the  constitution  of  society  still  remained  religious. 
During  the  phratrial  period,  indeed,  the  original 
meaning  of  sacrificial  rites  had  been  forgotten,  and 
numerous  myths  invented  to  explain  them ;  but  they 
still  continued  to  be  performed  with  ever-increasing 
pomp  and  circumstance,  though  with  a  new  aim.  This 
aim  was  conditioned  by  the  new  views  entertained  with 
regard  to  the  gods.  We  have  seen  that  in  .the  pa- 
triarchal period  the  gods  (if  we  may  so  call  them) 
were  the  imagined  ghosts  of  ancestors,  residing  m 
special  natural  objects ;  and  that  in  the  phratrial  pe- 
riod they  were  identified  with  the  powers  of  nature. 
In  what  we  may  now  call  the  political  period  they 
came  more  and  more  to  be  thought  of  as  beings 
standing  above  nature  and  guiding  it  according  to 
moral  ideas  ;  in  fact,  they  become  moral  gods.  This 
is  perhaps  the  most  momentous  change  that  ever  took 
place  in  human  history,  being,  indeed,  the  change 
jfrom  the -natural  to  the  spiritual  man.  When  sac- 
rifices were  offered  to  such  gods,  they  were  offered  as 
pledges  of  loyalty,  expressions  of  gratitude,  or  pro- 
pitiations for  disloyalty,  and  hence  were  usually  ac- 
companied with  prayers  for  benignity  and  aid. 

With  the  city-state  and  its  moral  gods,  Greek  social 
progress  reached  its  highest  point.  Some  steps  indeed 
were  taken  toward  the  foundation  of  a  nation  in  the 
establishment  of  the  great  periodical  gatherings  at 
Olympia,  Delphi,  Nemea,  and  other  places;  but  be- 
yond this  they  never  went.    All  attempts  to  go  further 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  43 

proved  uniformly  abortive.  No  confederation  even 
ever  included  the  whole  of  Greece.  On  the  other 
hand,  no  sooner  was  the  city-state  well  established 
than  it  began  to  react  upon  the  institutions  which 
had  paved  the  way  for  it,  modifying  them  in  such  a 
way  as  to  render  them  its  organs.  In  treating  of  this 
reactive  process  we  shall  direct  our  attention  to  Athens, 
(1)  because  her  history  may  be  regarded  as  typical, 
and  (2)  because  it  is  better  known  to  us  than  any 
other. 

From  the  earliest  times  of  which  we  have  any 
history,  Attica,  the  territory  ruled  by  the  nobles 
(evTrarptSat)  having  their  seat  in  Athens,  was  system- 
atically divided,  and  it  is  obvious  that  no  such  divi- 
sion could  have  taken  place  until  a  central  organ- 
izing power  was  constituted.  The  earliest  division  so 
established  seems  to  have  been  into  tribes,  correspond- 
ing to  social  status  and  profession,  but  in  part  also  to 
territorial  divisions.  Later  on  each  tribe  seems  to 
have  been  divided  into  three  trittyes  or  ridings,  cor- 
responding pretty  closely,  if  not  altogether,  to  the  old 
phratries ;  and  later  still,  each  trittys  into  four  nau- 
craries  or  fiscal  districts.  Just  luhen  these  arrange- 
ments were  made,  is  not  at  all  clear.  I  am  inclined  to 
think  that  the  first,  and  perhaps  the  second,  were  due 
to  Theseus,  while  the  third  was  not  introduced  till 
about  the  time  of  Solon.* 

*  The  four  ancient  tribes,  said  to  have  been  introduced  by 
Cecrops,  were  named  (1)  Geleontes,  or  nobles ;  (2)  Hopletes,  6r 
warriors ;  (3)  ^gicoreis,  or  shepherds ;  and  (4)  Argadeis,  or  crafts- 
men. Theseus  is  said  to  have  divided  the  people  into  three 
classes:  (1)  Eupatridai,  or  nobles;  (2)  Georaoroi,  or  farmers; 
^^Wvu.  "nemiourgoi,  or  craftsmen.    But  it  is  clear  that  if  Attica 


44         EDUCATION   OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

This  caste  system,  as  we  may  fairly  enough  call  it, 
continued  down  to  the  time  of  the  revolution  of  Clis- 
thenes.  This  founder  of  Athenian  democracy,  with 
the  aid  of  the  populace,  broke  up  the  old  caste  tribes 
and.  formed  ten  new  ones,  in  each  of  which  all  the 
castes  were  placed  on  an  equal  footing,  and  into  which 
many  new  citizens,  excluded  from  the  old  tribes,  were 
admitted.  These  tribes,  which  corresponded  to  no 
local  divisions,  were  each  subdivided  into  three  ridings 
(rptTTvcs)  and  ten  village-communities,  named,  as  far 
as  possible,  after  the  reputed  founders  of  the  old  patri- 
archal families,  and  arranged  in  such  a  way  that  neigh- 
boring demes  belonged  to  different  tribes.  The  tribes 
themselves  were  named  after  ancient  Attic  heroes. 

The  important  feature  in  this  new  division  was 
that  it  was  purely  political,  no  longer  religious,  as  the 
old  divisions  had  been.  As  Aristotle,  in  his  recently 
discovered  Constitution  of  Atheiis^  tells  us,  "the  clans 
(patriarchal  families),  phratries,  and  priesthoods  Clis- 
thenes  allowed  to  continue  in  their  hereditary  forms  " 
(cap.  xxi).  Thus,  for  the  first  time  in  history,  we 
have  a  country  in  which  the  citizens  live  under  two 
distinct  dispensations — the  one  religious  and  the  other 
political ;  for  as  soon  as  the  new  division  was  estab- 
lished, the  old  lost  its  political  features  and  signifi- 
cance, and  became  purely  religious.     It«  is  true  that 

was  not  united  under  one  government  until  the  time  of  Theseus, 
no  division  into  tribes  could  have  taken  place  till  then ;  and 
it  seems  to  me  that  Eupatridai  is  only  a  common  name  for 
Geleontes  and  Hopletes,  while  Geomoroi  and  Demiourgoi  are 
only  modern  names  for  -<Egicoreis  and  Argadeis  respectively. 
The  tripartite  division  plays  no  part  in  Attic  political  history. 
The  four  tribes  lasted  till  b.  c.  509. 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  45 

the  two  dispensations  did  not  stand  unrelated  (that 
would  have  been  impossible) ;  but  they  belonged  to 
two  different  orders  of  ideas,  and  exercised  distinct 
functions.  The  old  religious  dispensation  assumed 
men  to  be  held  together  in  society  by  a  blood-bond. 
This  had  partly  given  way,  first,  to  a  land-bond,  and, 
later,  to  a  worth-bond.  Each  of  these  bonds  was  sup- 
posed to  be  presided  over  by  a  deity.  When  the  worth- 
bond  was  reached,  its  presiding  divinity  was  necessarily 
conceived  as  a  spiritual  and  moral  being,  and  the  way 
was  paved  for  organizing  the  whole  of  society  by  means 
of  a  spiritual  bond.  This  was  done,  to  a  very  large 
extent,  in  the  democratic  constitution  of  Clisthenes. 
In  fact,  the  success  of  democracy  meant  the  triumph 
of  the  spiritual  bond  over  the  material  bond,  which 
had  been  the  basis  of  the  old  religious  constitutions ; 
and  though  these  were  not  completely  broken  up,  their 
sphere  of  action  was  confined  to  religious  observances. 
It  was,  in  great  measure,  to  this  separation  between 
Church  and  State,  as  we  may  call  it,  that  Athens  owed 
that  wonderful  development  of  material  and  spiritual 
power  which  followed  upon  the  revolution  of  Clis- 
thenes. 

We  have  thus  briefly  traced  the  growth  of  those 
institutions  in  which  Greek  life  successively  embodied 
its  social  ideals  :  (1)  the  patriarchal  family  or  clan ; 
(2)  the  phratry ;  (3)  the  city-state,  which,  rising  gradu- 
ally to  a  spiritual  ideal,  organized,  first,  the  tribe,  the 
riding,  and  the  naucrary,  and  subsequently  the  tribe, 
the  riding,  and  the  village  {Brj/xos;).  We  have  seen  that 
the  social  bond  of  the  city-state,  the  highest  of  Greek 
social  institutions,  was  worth  (apeTrj).  If  now  we  bear 
in  ^ind  that  at  all  periods  of  Greek  history  the  ideal 


46         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

of  life  was  social,  that  the  individual  and  the  citizen 
were  never  distinguished,  we  can  see  how  that  which . 
formed  the  social  bond  of  the  city-state  became  the 
ideal  of  life  for  the  individual,  and  consequently  the 
goal  of  education.. 

And  so,  indeed,  it  was.  In  Greece  the  ideal  of  life 
and  education  concentrated  itself  in  the  one  concep- 
tion of  worth.  It  is  true  that  this  conception  changed' 
its  content  as  time  went  on ;  but  it  always  connoted 
those  qualities  which  mark  the  worthy  member  of 
society.  For  the  reason  that  it  had  come  to  be  the 
social  bond  only  as  the  result  of  a  long  process,  it 
could  never  quite  belie  its  origin,  and  hence  never 
came  to  mean  simply  and  solely  moral  worth.  It 
always  contained  something  of  the  old  blood-  and 
land- bond.  Rarely,  indeed,  and  only  in  the  decline 
of  Greek  life,  was  worth  attributed  to  a  man,  unless 
he  could  claim  noble  birth  and  landed  wealth.  It 
was  this  fact  that  conditioned  the  nature  of  Athenian 
democracy,  and  that  constitutes  the  great  distinction 
between  it  and  the  democracies  of  modern  times, 
which  have  altogether  disowned  both  the  blood-  and 
the  land-bond. 

When  the  Greeks  first  come  before  us  in  the  pages 
of  Homer,  they  have  already,  for  the  most  part,  reached 
the  political  stage  marked  by  the  city-state.  Theseus, 
the  founder  of  the  Athenian  constitution,  has  already 
been  dead  for  a  generation.  But  though  even  in  those 
early  days  a  considerable  advance  had  been  made  toward 
a  moral  conception  of  the  gods,  yet  it  took  many  gen- 
erations before  this  assumed  definite  form  in  contra- 
distinction to  the  old  materialistic  notions,  and  many 
more  before  its  full  significance  revealed  itself  in  the 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  47 

organization  of  society  and  in  education,  which  always 
bore  a  close  relation  to  that  organization.  When  it 
did  finally  become  the  organizing  force  in  life,  and 
expressed  itself  in  democracy,  it  seemed  at  first  to 
draw  men  away  from  religion  altogether,  the  reason 
being  that  religion,  or  the  observances  of  religion,  had 
remained  at  the  older  point  of  view,  while  the  present 
social  force  occupied  the  new.  '  Jhe  gulf  thus  opened 
between  religion  and  political  life  the  Greeks  never 
succeeded  in  closing.  Their  efforts  to  do  so  expressed 
themselves  in  that  wonderful  product  of  the  Greek 
mind,  philosophy,  which  was  at  bottom  nothing  but 
an  attempt  to  find  a  justification  for  worth,  as  the 
social  bond,  in  the  constitution  of  the  universe,  or  tho 
nature  of  the  gods ;  we  may  perhaps  say,  to  bring  the 
gods  and  their  world  up  to  the  new  moral  idea.  But 
while  the  best  men  were  trying  to  embody  the  now 
bond  in  life,  the  two  older  bonds — blood  and  wealth — 
were  fighting  for  supremacy  ;  and  in  the  struggle  be- 
tween them  Greece  perished,  leaving  her  ideal  to  be 
realized  elsewhere.  And  it  has  not  yet  been  realized 
fully.  From  the  da3^s  of  Clisthenes  to  our  own,  phi- 
losopher and  priest  and  statesman  have  vainly  endeav- 
ored to  reconcile  religion  and  politics,  until  now,  at 
last,  we  have  come  to  congratulate  ourselves  upon 
what  seems  their  permanent  separation.  But  recon- 
ciled they  will  undoubtedly  one  day  be,  when  we  come 
to  understand  wherein  human  worth  really  consists, 
and  to  see  that  it  is,  and  must  be,  the  sole  end  of  all 
human  institutions:* 

*  It  is  curious  to  note  that,  in  the  breaking  up  of  the  soli- 
Qvdty  between  religioi^  and  politics,  the  Greeks  under  Clisthenes 


48         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

Worth,  then — the  worth  of  the  individual  as  a  mem- 
ber of  society — was  the  Greek  ideal  of  life  and  educa-  - 
tion.  Of  course,  the  content  of  this  ideal  differed, 
with  the  demands  of  society,  from  generation  to  gen- 
eration. In  early  times,  when  the  city-state  was  fight- 
ing for  existence  against  enemies  at  home  and  abroad, 
worth  necessarily  consisted  in  practical  ability — in  be- 
ing able  to  see,  and  in  public  to  express,  what  needed 
to  be  done,  and  in  being  prompt  and  effective  in  the 
doing  of  it.  Such  is  the  worth  which  we  find  aimed 
at  by  the  heroes  in  Homer,  by  Agamemnon,  Achilles, 
and  the  rest.  Of  course,  the  Greeks  could  hardly  con- 
ceive, either  then  or  at  any  time,  that  such  virtue  could 
be  attained  by  any  man  who  was  not  well-born  and 
possessed  of  wealth  ;  still,  these  advantages  were  by  no 
means  conceived  as  constituting  worth  or  public  use- 
fulness, as  they  have  sometimes  been  since. 

Later  on,  when  the  social  organization  became  more 
secure,  when  the  citizens  (iroXtrai)  were  not  obliged  to 
devote  all  their  energies  to  defending  it,  when  they 
enjoyed  a  certain  amount  of  leisure  which  they  felt 
the  necessity  of  occupying  worthily,  new  elements  en- 
tered into  the  conception  of  worth.  If  a  man  would 
deserve  the  title  of  worthy  now,  he  must  be  able,  not 
only  to  do  his  part  in  the  practical  and  necessary 
business  of  life,  but  also  to  fill  the  time  gained  from 
business  with  occupations  which  should  be  ends  in 

went  the  one  way  and  founded  a  purely  political  institution,  while 
the  Hebrews,  under  Isaiah,  went  the  other,  and  laid  the  foun- 
dations of  a  Church.  Christianity  has  sought  in  vain  to  unite 
these  two  institutions  in  a  Kingdom  of  Heaven,  wherein  He- 
brew prophecy  and  Greek  philosophy  shall  supplement  each 
other.  -he 


UREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  49 

themselves,  looking  to  nothing  beyond.  Such  time, 
and  the  occupations  which  belonged  to  it,  were  called 
by  the  Greeks  Staytoyi}  (diagoge),  a  word  for  which  our 
language  offers  no  equivalent.  We  must  dwell  upon 
it,  and  the  thought  expressed  by  it,  for  a  moment. 

To  the  cultivated  Greek,  life  divided  itself  sharply 
into  two  portions,  one  to  be  devoted  to  means,  and  the 
other  to  ends.  Under  means  was  included  whatever 
related  to  practical  life,  the  earning  of  a  livelihood, 
politics,  war,  education,  religious  observance's,  etc.; 
under  ends,  what  were  called  the  occupations  of  the 
Muses — that  is,  fine  art,  science,  and  philosophy. 
These,  indeed,  were  the  ends  to  which  all  other  oc- 
cupations were  but  means.  The  enjoyment  of  them 
was  designated  by  the  term  StaycoyvJ,  which  must  be 
clearly  distinguished,  not  only  from  practical  life,  but 
also  from  mere  play  or  amusement.  Play  was  regarded 
as  a  mere  preparation  for  practical  work,  therefore  as 
a  means  to  a  means  :  Staywyi;,  on  the  contrary,  was  the 
end  and  aim  of  practical  work.  This  distinction  con- 
ditioned the  whole  of  Greek  life  and  education.  It  is 
to  be  found  in  Homer  * ;  it  passed  over  from  Greek 
thought  into  historical  Christianity,  and  became  a 
powerful  factor  in  it.  When  the  Middle  Age,  follow- 
ing the  Neoplatonists,  said  that  the  contemplative  life 

*  Odysseus  {Odyss.,  ix,  5  sgq.)  says  :  "  For  I  declare  there  is 
no  more  delightful  eiid  than  when  festivity  takes  possession  of  a 
whole  people,  and  the  guests  in  the  palace  listen  to  the  minstrel, 
sitting  in  rows ;  and  the  tables  beside  them  are  loaded  with 
bread  and  meats,  and  the  cup-bearer,  drawing  wine  from  tlio 
mixing-bowl,  carries  it  round  and  pours  it  into  the  cups.  This 
seems  to  my  heart  to  be  something  very  beautiful."  To  this 
overv  Greek  heart  would  have  responded. 

/ 


50         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

was  the  goal  of  the  practical,  it  was  only  repeating 
the  Greek  doctrine  in  slightly  different  words. 

Bearing  in  mind  now  that  the  ideal  of  Greek  life 
was  worth,  and  that  this  meant  capability  in  all  the 
spheres  of  activity,  whether  practical  or  "  diagogic," 
we  can  have  little  difficulty  in  seeing  what  the  charac- 
ter and  limits  of  the  education  which  sought  to  impart 
such  capability  must  have  been.  It  is  obvious  that, 
just  as  the  spheres  of  activity  were  different  at  differ- 
ent times  and  places,  so  likewise  were  the  systems  of 
education.  In  primitive  times,  when  life  was  mainly 
practical,  education  was  a  preparation  for  practice. 
As  life  became  more  and  more  diagogic,  education 
followed  in  the  same  direction.  Again,  while  some 
states  like  Athens  made  room  for  and  encouraged 
diagogic  life,  others,  like  Sparta,  opposed  it,  and  re- 
mained almost  completely  within  the  practical  sphere. 
It  followed  that  the  Athenian  and  Spartan  schemes  of 
education  were  widely  different. 

As  in  dealing  with  Greek  education  our  chief  at- 
tention will  be  directed  to  Athens,  we  may  consider 
for  a  moment  the  extent  and  divisions  of  the  Athenian 
citizen's  range  of  activity. 

Every  citizen  was  a  member,  firsts  of  a  family 
(otKos)  ;  second^  of  a  township  (8^/aos)  ;  thirds  of  a 
phratry  {cfyparpia)  ;  fourth^  of  a  riding  (rptTrvs)  ;  fifth, 
of  a  tribe  {ffivXrj)  ;  and  sixth,  of  the  state  (ttoAis)  ;  and 
each  of  these  relations  involved  special  duties.*    As 

*  This  of  course  refers  to  post-Clisthenean  times.  In  earlier 
days  every  citizen  was  a  member  of  a  clan  {y^vos)  and  of  a  nau- 
crary  (vavKpapla).  Clisthenes  deprived  the  clans  of  all  political 
significance,  by  admitting  to  citizenship  many  who  did  not  be- 
long to  them,  while  the  naucraries  he  entirely  abohshed. 

\ 


GREEK  LIFE  AND  ITS  IDEALS.  51 

member  of  a  family,  a  man  had  duties  as  priest,  as  hus- 
band, as  father,  and  as  owner  of  property  and  slaves ; 
as  member  of  a  township,  he  had  to  do  his  part  in 
everything  that  related  to  the  property,  the  worship, 
and  the  internal  laws  of  the  town,  as  well  as  in  every- 
thing that  had  to  do  with  its  relations  to  the  superior 
institutions ;  as  member  of  a  phratry,  he  had  to  par- 
ticipate in  certain  religious  rites,  and  to  aid  in  pro- 
tecting the  state  against  the  unlawful  assumption  by 
spurious  children  of  the  rights  of  citizenship.  His 
membership  in  a  riding  and  a  tribe  merely  determined 
the  company  in  which  he  should  act  in  his  various 
relations  as  member  of  the  state.  These  relations  in- 
volved duties  of  three  kinds  besides  those  of  religion  : 
(1)  administrative,  (2)  judicial,  (3)  military.  It  is 
needless  to  say  that  these  were  regarded  as  his  su- 
preme duties.  It  thus  appears  that  the  Athenian  citi- 
zen who  wished  to  claim  the  honor  (rt/z^)  of  worth, 
had  to  be  a  good  husband,  a  good  father,  a  good  prop- 
erty-owner, a  good  town-member,  a  good  state-officer, 
a  good  judge,  a  good  soldier,  and,  along  with  all  this, 
a  pious  worshiper  of  the  gods  of  every  institution  of 
which  he  was  a  member.  These  were  his  practical 
duties,  and  in  early  times  were  all  that  was  expected 
of  him.  If  he  failed  in  any  of  them  he  could  be 
reached  by  the  arm  of  the  law.  But  in  proportion  as 
diagogic  life  became  possible  and  was  aimed  at,  other 
duties  which  the  law  could  not  enforce  were  added  to 
these  by  the  power  of  public  opinion.  It  then  became 
incumbent  upon  a  man  to  be  able  to  take  an  intelli- 
,  i,{.  fQJrt  in  all  those  social  avocations  with  which 
ret^sought  to  occupy  their  leisure  hours  in  a  worthy 
V^odlike  way,  by  giving  free  and  self-sufficient  ex- 


52         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

pression  to  their  own  noblest  nature.  These  avoca- 
tions consisted  chiefly  ifi  feasting,  in 'the  enjoyment  of 
the  various  products  of  the  liberal  arts,  and  in  serious 
conversation.  In  the  first  the  animal  nature,  in  the 
second  the  emotional  nature,  in  the  third  the  intellect, 
found  free  expression.  It  was  altogether  characteristic 
of  the  Greek,  and  particularly  of  the  Athenian,  to  see 
that  in  that  activity  which  formed  the  end  of  life  no 
part  of  his  nature  should  be  neglected.  We  must  not 
forget  that  to  him  feasting  bore  the  same  relation  to 
ordinary  eating  and  drinking  that  the  "  fine"  arts  bore 
to  the  useful.  He  had  not  forgotten  that  in  the  "  good 
old  time  "  the  worship  of  the  gods  consisted  chiefly  of 
feasting.  For  these  diagogic  occupations,  no  less  than 
for  the  practical  ones,  an  education  was  needed,  and 
indeed  such  an  education  formed  an  essential  part  of 
the  life-preparation  of  every  Athenian  who  laid  any 
claim  to  worth. 

Such,  then,  was  the  origin  and  nature  of  the  Greek 
ideal  of  life — the  ideal  which  at  every  stage  determined 
the  character  of  Greek  education. 


*  "tal 

■•^litiiy 
^t  sh- 
^4 


CHAPTER  III. 

GREEK   EDUCATION"   BEFORE   THE   RISE   OF 
PHILOSOPHY. 

The  history  of  Greek  education — that  is^  of  educa- 
tion in  free  Greece — is  divided  into  two  fairly  distinct 
periods  by  two  contemporaneous  events,  the  conflict 
with  Persia  and  the  rise  of  philosophy^  In  the  period 
previous  to  these  events  education  was  for  the  most 
part  a  preparation  for  practical  life;  in  the  period 
succeeding  them  it  aimed  more  and  more  at  being  a 
preparation  for  diagogic  life.  In  what  is  called  the 
Hellenistic  period,  when  Greece  was  no  longer  free, 
the  latter  tendency  altogether  gained  the  upper  hand, 
for  the  reason  mainly  that  practical  life,  in  the  old 
Greek  sense,  no  longer  existed.  I  purpose  in  the 
present  lecture  to  deal  with  the  education  of  the  first 
period,  with  what  Aristophanes  in  his  Clouds  calls 
the  "  Old  Education." 

The  period  in  question  begins  for  us  with  the 
social  condition  presented,  in  the  Homeric  poems. 
Already  the  Greeks  have  passed.,  beyond  the  patri- 
archal *nd  phratrial  stages  of  civilization  and  have 
ancwcloped  the  city-state   and  the  tribe.*     Notwith- 

the  bi-^ 

that  r  "^^^  phratry  i<p(yf}Tpri)  and  the  tribe  (<pv\ov)  are  both  men- 
l[ypj'd  in  Iliad  ii,  3G2-3 ;  but  this  does  not  belong  to  the  oldest 
of  the  work. 


U/ 


54:        EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

standing  this,  there  exists  as  yet  nothing  resembling 
a  school.  Whatever  education  there  is,  not  only  forms 
a  preparation  for  practical  life,  but  is  also  gained  in 
practical  life — in  the  house,  the  agora,  the  council,  the 
field,  the  camp.  The  growing  boy,  as  soon  as  he  passes 
out  of  the  hands  of  nurses,  spends  his  time  in  the  com- 
pany of  men,  learning  by  precept  and  example  to  do 
what  they  do,  and  discovering  by  means  of  his  own 
wits  why  they  do  it.  At  first  he  imitates  them  in  play 
with  his  fellows ;  but  as  soon  as  his  powers  permit,  he 
takes  serious  part  in  their  occupations.  It  was,  indeed, 
v/v^the  aim  of  the  Greek,  at  all  periods,  to  render  his  sons 
independent  members  of  society  at  as  early  an  age  as 
possible. 

It  is  not  easy  for  us,  with  our  mediaBval  notions  of  the 
value  of  school  education,  to  think  that  a  man  could 
be  really  educated  who  had  never  heard  of  a  school ; 
but  this  is  due  to  the  fact  that  we  find  it  difficult  to 
realize  the  conditions  of  early  Greek  life.  Our  lives 
are  so  hedged  round  with  confentionalities,  which  in  a 
thousand  ways  sunder  us  and  prevent  us  from  sharing 
our  spiritual  wealth  with  each  other,  that  we  can  scarce- 
ly conceive  a  state  of  things  irr  which  such  conven- 
tionalities hardly  existed,  when  every  member  of  a  state 
looked  upon  every  other  as  a  brother ;  *  when  men  lived 
mostly  in  the  open  air  and  in  hourly  contact  with  each 
other,  conversing,  playing,  hunting,  worshipingjdelib- 
^ 

*  Macaulay  was  guilty  of  no  exaggeration  when  he  said : 

"  The  Romans  were  like  brothers  >*  "^^ 

In  the  brave  days  of  old."  (liti  ill? 

Compare  Dante's  bitter  reflections  on  his  own  time,  Pubt  sh- 

tory,  vi,  76  sqq.  )  ^TA 


.BEFORE  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  55 

erating,  drilliDg,  fighting,  in  fact  doing  everything  to- 
gelh-eTpwhen ■'there  were  no  titles — no  "Mr."  even — 
no  famiiy  names,  no  rules  of  etiquette,  nothing  to  pre- 
vent any  one  from  addressing,  or  even  "pumping," 
anybody  iie  met.  Under  such  circumstances  the  ex- 
perience and  accomplishments  of  each  could  not  fail 
to  be  communicated  to  all,  especially  as  a  continual 
rivalry  was  going  on,  which  greatly  stimulated  the 
pursuit  of  excellence.  This  rivalry,  or  tendency  to 
competition,  wasastronglj  marked  trait  of  the  Greek 
chaiacter  at  alTperiods.  To  it  were  due  not  only  such 
institutions  as  the  great  games,  but  likewise  much  of 
what  is  best  in  Greek  science,  philosophy,  and  art.  But 
the  horizon  of  the  early  Greek  was  not  bounded  by  the 
limits  of  his  own  state.  War,  trade,  and  piracy*  were 
continually  bringing  him  into  contact  with  foreigners 
and  foreign  wares. f  His  captives  became  his  slaves, 
and  had  many  tales  to  tell  of  far-oif  lands  and  strange 
customs  and  gods.  J  And  then  there  was  the  omni- 
present, ever- welcome  wandering  minstrel,  who,  like 
Odysseus,  "had  seen  the  cities  of  many  men  and 
known  their  minds,"  in  whose  songs  were  stored  up 
the  history  of  past  ages  and  the  descriptions  of  distant 
lands,  and  who  dispensed  his  lore  in  the  form  best 
suited  to  hold  the  memory,  to  fill  the  imagination, 
and  to  influence  the  conduct.  *Thus  the  Homeric 
Greeks,  though  perhaps  not  one  in  a  thousand   of 

*  "  Krieg,  Handel  und  Piraterie, 
and  ^    Dreieinig  sind  sie,  nicht  zu  trennen." — Faust,  Pt.  ii. 
the  bri^he  objects  recently  nnearthed  at  Mycenae,  Spata,  and 
that  is>>laces  show  how  much  foreign  art  was  introduced  into 
livpp  ^.  even  in  pre-Homeric  times, 
'"^^^y  Witness  the  case  of  Euma?us  in  the  Odyssey. 
'    I 


56         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

them  could  read  or  write,  were,  in  the  very  truest 
sense,  educated  people,  and  their  education  was  all  the 
better,  fresher,  and  more  serviceable,  that  it  was  gained 
amid  the  concrete  relations  of  actual  life,  and  laid  hold 
of  the  whole  living  human  being — his  affections  and 
his  will,  no  less  than  his  memory  and  his  intelligence. 
There  is  nothing  that  delights  us  in  the  Homeric  Greek 
/more  than  his  perfect  simplicity, directness, undisguised 
feeling,  and  natural  freedom  from  palaver  and  senti- 
mentality. And  it  is  not  difficult  to  see  that  he  owed 
these  charming  qualities,  which  must  forever  make 
him  attractive,  to  the  character  of  his  education,  which 
from  first  to  last  kept  him  in  the  closest  contact  with 
the  facts  of  life — domestic,  social,  and  political.  It 
was  in  the  small  city-states  of  Greece  that  the  finer  ele- 
ments of  human  nature — devoted,  unselfish  friendship, 
domestic  purity,  respect  for  women,  reverence  for  law, 
loyalty  to  institutions — were  first  able  clearly  to  mani- 
fest themselves.  It  may  well  be  doubted  whether  at 
any  subsequent  period  of  their  history  the  Greeks  were 
as  well  educated,  in  the  true  sense  of  that  word,  as 
they  were  in  the  days  of  Homer.  No  other  period  has 
given  us  men  equal  to  Hector  and  Achilles,  or  women- 
equal  to  Penelope  and  Nausicaa. 

The  age  described  by  Homer  was  one  of  great  en- 
ergy and  brilliancy  in  all  directions — one  of  those  ages 
in  which  men  and  women  seem  to  attain  thSy-  full 
stature.  But  ere  he  came  upon  the  scene  it  w^  draw- 
ing to  a  close.  It  was  succeeded  by  what,  by  wa"v 
contrast,  may  be  called  a  "  dark  age  " — an  age  of  >  '•tal 
unrest,  of  tribal  migrations,  of  rapid  dissolution  yuti  lid 
ties  and  institutions,  and  slow  and  painful  estaV  sh- 
ment  of  new  ones.     During  this  period,  which  lA  i.^ll 


BEFORE  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  57 

for  over  three  hundred  years — a  period  of  which  neither 
history,  poetry,  nor  archaeology  has  left  us  any  con- 
nected or  adequate  account — the  older  civilization, 
which  seems  to  have  reached  its  culmination  under 
the  empire  of  the  "  wide-ruling  Agamemnon,"  faded 
away  into  a  gigantic 'myth,*  thus  passing  gradually 
from  the  hands  of  History  into  those  of  Poetry. 
About  the  middle  of  the  eighth  century  B.  c,  Greece 
reappears  in  the  pages  of  history  and  in  the  dis- 
coveries of  archaeology;  but  she  is  a  very  different 
Greece  from  that  which  vanished  three  centuries  be- 
fore. She  appears  now  as  a  cluster  of  independent 
and  mutually  hostile  states,  each  fighting  over  again 
the  battle  for  existence,  and  each  claiming  for  itself  a 
share  in  the  mythic  renown  of  the  heroic  past,  which 
Homer  has  already  made  forever  glorious.  She  rises, 
as  it  were,  from  her  grave,  with  Homer  in  her  hand, 
and  Homer  henceforth  largely  shapes  her  destinies. 
Her  people  are  henceforth  a  "  people  of  the  book.''  f 
It  would  hardly  be  possible  to  overestimate  the  impor- 
tance of  this  fact. 

A  people  with  a  book  is  something  very  difPerent 
from  a  people  without  a  book.  A  book  not  only  en- 
riches by.  its  contents  the  intellectual  and  imaginative 
life  of  a  people,  but  it  divides  their  world  into  two 

*  See  Goethe's  splendid  description  of  this  in  the  opening  oT' 
the  fourth  act  of  the  second  part  of  Faust. . 

f  AMu  H-hitahi,  as  Muhammad  called  the  Jews,  Christians, 
and  Saba^ans.  It  is  true  that  the  Greeks  were  never  a  "  people  of 
the  book"  in  the  same  sense  that  the  Jews  and  Christians  are  ; 
that  is,  they  never  made  a  book  tlie  authoritative  law  of  their 
lives  •  ^/n^ertheless,  it  seems  plain  that  Homer  exerted  a  para- 
'    "     influence  upon  their  wh^^e  spiritual  development. 


EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

parts — one  real,  the  other  ideal ;  one  that  is,  the  other 
that  ought  to  be.  The  old  idyllic  immediateness  and 
joyous  satisfaction  with  the  present  arei;gone.  The 
actual  is  found  to  be  partial,  and  has  to  be  supple- 
mented by  an  imagined  past,  thrown  as  a  possibility 
upon  the  vacant  screen  of  the  future.  Hence  a  strain 
of  pathos,  forming  a  discord,  runs  through  the  whole 
of  life,  becoming  more  and  more  sensible  as  time  goes 
on.*  When  it  becomes  apparent  that  this  discord  can 
not  be  resolved  in  every-day  practical  life,  an  attempt 
is  made  to  supplement  this  by  another  kind  of  life,  in 
which  it  may  be  resolved.  If  this  is  conceived  as  pos- 
sible in  this  world,  there  results  an  endeavor  after  what 
e^Greeks  called  diagogic  life ;  if  not,  there  is  born 
the  cohcjeption^oT  a  heaven,  hid  from  mortal  eyes  in 
he  depths  of  the  unseen. 

Among  the  Greeks  the  result  of  the  separation  be- 
tween real  and  ideal  life,  consequent  upon  the  posses- 
sion of  a  book,  was  an  endeavor  after  diagogic  life; 
and  it  was  in  seeking  to  realize  this  that  they  devoted 
themselves  to  art,  science,  and  philosophy,  the  social 
enjoyment  of  which  constituted  StayoxyT^.f  The  effort 
in  this  direction  naturally  began  with  the  recital  of  the 
poems  of  Homer.    This  called  into  existence  a  class  of 


^  \ap] 


*  This  pathos,  which  is  almost  entirely  lacking  in  Homer,  is 
apparent  from  the  first  in  the  authors  of  what  we  may  call  the 
enaissance.  It  is  quite  marked  even  in  Hesiod,  whose  works 
open  the  new  period.  The  elegiac  and  lyric  poets  are  full  of  it 
— Callinus,  Theognis,  Alcman,  Simonides,  etc. 

f  When  Aristotle  divides  the  sciences  into  practical  and 
theoretical,  he  means  that  the  former  find  their  application  in 
practical  life,  while  the  latter  serve  for  StoycwT^.  Theor^/^ewpfa) 
is  the  occupation  even  of  the  gor  .,  who  enjoy  perpetual 


^-^tk 


BEFORE  TFB^ISE  OF  PHJtiOSOPnY.  59 

men  known  as  rhapsodes  (paif/oiSoL).  The  first  of  these 
is  said,  and  with  apparent  truth,  to  have  been  Hesiod, 
whose  own  works  long  held  a  place  beside  those  of 
Homer.  ;  The  rhapsodes  differed  from  the  old  minstrels 
(dotSoi),  ar~epTc  poet-singers,  in  three  ways :  (1)  they 
merely  recited  the  works  of  others :  they  were  not 
(usually  at  least)  poets ;  (2)  they  gave  no  musical  ac- 
companiment ;  (3)  they  frequently  accompanied  their 
recitations  with  a  commentary,  or  exposition.*  In 
fact,  they  bore  very  much  the  same  relation  to  the 
epic  poets  that  the  scribes  (sopherim)  among  the 
Jews  did  to  the  prophets ;  and,  indeed,  the  prophets 
of  the  Greeks  were  their  poets  {vates).  But  the  poems 
of  Homer  and  Hesiod  did  not  long  remain  the  only 
occupation  of  8tay<i>yi;.  There  soon  arose  poems  of  a 
new  order — no  longer  epic,  but  elegiac,  lyric,  and 
gnomic — and  these  were  accompanied  with  new  kinds 
of  music,  more  varied  and  also  more  complicated  than 
the  old.  The  various  kinds  of  poetry,  with  their  dif- 
ferent accompaniments,  were  included  under  the  com- 
mon term  music  (/aovo-iktj),  i.  e..  Muses'  work,  whose 
patrons  were  the  Muses.  These,  with  the^gods  whose 
company  they  kept— Dionysus,  Apollo,  Hermes— thus 
became  the  divinities  of  Staywy^,  which,  like  the  rest 
of  life,  was  essentially  religious. 

.^ut  with  the  division  of  life  into  two  parts — one 
real,  Tihe  other  ideal — there  came  a  division  of  men 
into  two  classes :  one  whose  life  was  confined  to  the 
real ;  the  other,  which  could  rise  into  the  ideal,  the 

*  See  Plato's  Ion  and  Isocrates'  Panath.,  p.  239.  Hence 
Heraclitus  could  say  of  the  people  of  his  time;  "  Hesiod  is  the 
teacher  of  most"  (Frag,  xxxv,  By  water). 


60         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GRE3SK  PEOPLE. 

crown  and  end  of  life  (to  TeA.os).*  The  latter  alone 
were  supposed  to  be  gentlemen  (iXevOepLOL) ;  and  thus 
gentlemanliness  came  to  be  associated  with  elegant 
leisure. f  Again,  as  Siayoryij  came  to  occupy  a  larger 
and  larger  place  in  life,  so  its  presiding  deities  came 
more  and  more  to  be  worshiped.  But  these  deities, 
one  and  all,  were,  if  we  may  so  speak,  deities  of  the 
unseen  and  ideal,  and  hence  their  worship  always  con- 
tained a  mystic  element.  This  is  especially  true  of 
Dionysus  and  the  Muses;  and  it  is  clear  that  the 
whole  mystic  or  Orphic  tendency  which  we  find  in 
post-Homeric — we  might  fairly  say,  post-Kenaissance 
— Greek  literature,  from  Hesiod  J  onward,  is  closely 
connected  with  their  worship.  But  mysticism  in  re- 
ligion always  implies  a  strong  reflective  and  panthe- 
istic tendency  in  thought,  and  tbis  shows  itself,  not 
only  in  Hesiod,  but  still  mojje^clearly  in  the  so-called 
Orphic  poetry,  some  of  which  is  probably  of  the  same 
date.  It  was  this  tendency  that,  in  course  of  time, 
took  form  in  Greek  philosophy,  w^hich  w^as  never  quite 
able  to  emancipate  itself  from  pantheism. 

It  would  be  easy  to  ttace  to  StayoyyTJ  the  origin,  not 
only  of  philosophy,  but  also  of  all  the  things  with 
which  cultured  leisure  was  occupied — art,  symposia, 
etc. — as  well  as  of  those  later  philosophic  societies  or 

*  Aristotle  objects  to  young  people's  being  allowed  to  enjoy 
Siayaryf),  on  the  ground  that  "  the  crown  of  perfection  belongs 
not  to  the  imperfect "  (ou5e  yap  areXct  Trpoa-ffKei  r4\os,  Pol.  viii,  4). 

f  Tb  KoXhy  Kcd  rh  tjSv,  the  noble  and  the  pleasant,  the  elements 
of  happiness,  according  to  Aristotle. 

^  Hesiod  himself  stood  in  close  relation  to  the  famous  scat 
of  the  Muses  on  Mount  Helicon.  See  the  opening  lines  of  tho 
Theogony  and  Works  and  Days,  656  sqq. 

\     ■ 


BEFORE  THE  RISE  OP  PHILOSOPHY.  Gl 

brotherhoods,  which  strove  to  make  diagogic  life  per- 
manent and  "  separate  from  the  world  "  of  practical 
life.  But  the  important  points  in  the  whole  diagogic 
tendency,  and  those  which  have  a  bearing  on  educa- 
tion, are  these  :^(1)  that  it  divided  life  into  two  dis- 
tinct, though  correlated,  parts ;  (2)  that  it  separated 
men  into  two  classes ;  (3)  that  it  called  into  existence 
the  conception  of  a  life  which  was  an  end  in  itself ; 
(4)  that  it  strove  to^ll  that  life  with  enjoyments  which 
had  no  object  beyond  themselves,  unless,  indeed,  it 
might  be  to  prepare  for  higher  enjoyments  of  a  similar 
kind ;  and  (5)  that  it  caused  such  life  to  be  regarded 
as  the  only  true  and  worthy  life,  the  only  life  capable 
of  being  eternal.  It  was  long,  indeed,  before  all  these 
results  of  the  tendency  confpletely  manifested  them- 
selves ;  nevertheless,  -we  must  recognize  its  presence 
and  working  from  the  days  of  Hesiod  onward,  if  we 
desire  to  follow  intelligently  the  course  of  Greek  edu- 
cation. From  the  time  of  Hesiod  up  to  the  rise  of 
philosophy  proper  the  practical  tendency  still  prevails 
in  life  and  education  ;  after  that  the  diagogic  gradu- 
ally gains  the  upper  hand,  until  finally,  in  the  Hel- 
lenistic period,  it  occupies  the  entire  field.  At  present 
we  ai*^  dealing  with  the  old  period,  in  which  the  ideal 
of  worth  still  connoted,  for  the  most  part,  only  what 
were  called  "political"  virtues.*  The  only  "theo- 
retic "  virtue  it  included  was  the  power  to  enjoy  poetry 
and  music — %o  enjoy,  not  to  2)rodnce. 

From  the  earliest  times  of  which  we  have  any  his- 

*  When  the  two  kinds  of  life  were  clearly  distinguished  in 
consciousness,  the  corresponding  virtues  were  distinguished  as 
political  and  theoretical  {TroKiriKal  koI  Oewpr^nitai). 


62        EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

torical  record  Greek  education  was  divided  into  two 
parts :  (1)  Gymnastics  for  the  body,  and  (2)  Music  for 
the  soul.  The  soul  in  this  connection  does  not  include 
the  intelligence,  for  it  was  long  before  the  Greeks 
thought  of  providing  any  kind  of  education  for  it-. 
Music  was  merely  an  exercise  for  the  soul,  intended 
to  strengthen  and  harmonize  its  emotions,  just  as 
gymnastics  strengthened  and  harmonized  the  bodily 
faculties.  Both  parts  of  education,  therefore,  were 
equally  intended  as  a  preparation  for  practical  life, 
and  so  long  as  these  constituted  the  whole  of  educa- 
tion, no  schools,  in  the  modern  sense  of  the  term,  seem 
to  have  been  found  necessary.  Young  men  could  learn 
gymnastics  and  music,  just  as  they  did  in  Homer's 
time,  by  watching  and  imitating  the  exercises  of  their 
elders.  Schools,  in  all  probability,  were  introduced 
only  when  special  provision  had  to  be  made  for  the 
intelligence — that  is,  when  the  intelligence  had  to  ac- 
quire something  that  could  not  be  learned  in  the  ordi- 
nary course  of  life.  This  something  was  reading  and 
writing — ypdfXfxaTa  (letters),  as  the  Greeks  said.  Just 
at  what  time  letters  came  to  be  regarded  as  an  essen- 
tial part  of  education  is  not  quite  clear ;  but  it  was 
probably  not  long  before  the  year  B.  c.  600,  which  we 
may  perhaps  set  down  as  the  date  of  the  earliest  prose- 
composition.  For  some  time  before  that  they  seem  to 
have  been  used  for  commercial  purposes,  for  inscrip- 
tions, and,  by  the  rhapsodes  and  lyric  singers,  for  re- 
cording poetical  productions,  which  at  that  time  had 
become  too  numerous  to  be  carried  in  the  memory. 
The  fact  that  the  "  musicians  "  were  the  first  persons 
who  employed  letters  for  literary  purposes,  combined 
with  the  other  fact  that  they  were  always  regarded  in 


BEFORE  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOx  „^ 

the  light  of  public  teachers,  helps  to  explain  n^  ^i 
came  about  that  they  were  for  many  ages  the  sou 
teachers  of  letters.  Letters,  in  fact,  were  considered  a 
part  of  music,  and  thus  it  came  to  pass  that  all  litera- 
ture, no  matter  what  its  subject,  was  placed  under  the 
auspices  of  the  Muses  and  their  leader  Apollo  (hence 
Movo-ayeriys),  who  for  this  reason  became  the  patron 
deities  of  schools. 

At  whatever  date  schools  may  have  come  into  exist- 
ence, it  is  certain  that  in  the  time  of  Solon,  about  b.  c. 
590,  they  were  already  in  full  operation  in  Athens,  and 
that  alongside  of  them  there  were  regular  institutions 
for  physical  training.  Solon  found  it  necessary  to 
make  laws,  some  of  which  are  still  extant,  for  both. 
A  music  school  was  called  StSoo-KoAetov,  and  the  master 
of  it  KL6apL(TTrj<:  (lute-player),  while  the  school  for  phys- 
ical training  was  called  TraXaia-rpa  (wrestling-ground) 
and  its  master  TrathoTpipri^  (boy-thresher  or  boy- 
kneader).  Between  the  two  schools  the  Athenian 
boy  spent  most  of  his  day,  from  sunrise  to  sunset ; 
and  Solon  had  to  make  a  law  forbidding  teachers  to 
have  their  schools  open  before  the  former,  or  after  the 
latter,  of  these  hours. 

Athenian  boys,  and  Greek  boys  generally,  went  to 
school  about  the  age  of  seven.  ITp  to  that  time 
they  remained  at  home  with  their  sisters,  under  the 
charge  of  their  mothers  mostly,  or  of  whatever  nurses 
she  might  choose  to  appoint.  Greek  girls,  except  in 
Sparta  and  some  ^olian  cities,  did  not  go  to  school  at 
all.  As  long  as  education  was  meant  to  be  merely  a 
preparation  for  practical  life,  it  was,  of  course,  deter- 
,  mined  by  the  demands  of  that  life.  For  a  man  prac- 
,    \tical  life  meant  the  life  of  a  husband,  father,  and  prop- 


62         ACTUATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEG 

tori'^owner,  and  of  a  member  of  a  village,  a  j. 
and  a  state ;  for  a  woman  it  meant  the  life  of  a  ., 
mother,  and  housekeeper.  Hence  every  effort  was 
made  to  bring  a  boy  as  soon  as  possible  into  contact 
with  public  life,  while  a  girl  was  rigidly  excluded  from 
it  and  confined  to  the  home.  It  was  only  as  diagogic 
education  came  into  prominence  that  men  and  women 
met  on  a  common  ground  outside  the  home ;  and  even 
then  the  meeting  was  not  accomplished  without  difii- 
culty  and  moral  confusion. 

"While  children  were  under  the  care  of  their  mothers 
and  nurses,  the  first  aim  of  the  education  imparted  to 
them  was  to  strengthen  their  bodies ;  the  second,  to 
inspire  them  with  reverence  for  their  elders ;  and  the 
third,  to  fill  their  imaginations  with  pictures  of  heroic 
deeds  drawn  from  the  mythology  or  history  of  their 
race.  With  a  view  to  the  first,  they  were  nourished 
on  simple  food,  allowed  plenty  of  sleep  and  open-air 
exercise,  and  inured,  as  far  as  possible,  to  heat  and 
cold.  They  seem  to  have  worn  almost  no  clothing. 
With  a  view  to  the  second,  they  were  trained  to  habits 
of  silence,  obedience,  and  respectful  demeanor  in  the 
presence  of  their  parents.  At  table  they  ate  only  what 
was  handed  to  them.  With  a  view  to  the  third,  they 
were  entertained  with  songs  and  stories  about  gods 
and  goddesses,  heroes  and  heroines — stories  of  which 
an  abundant  supply,  expressed  in  poetic  language, 
was  to  be  found  in  the  epics  of  Homer  and  the  later 
cyclic  poets,  not  to  mention  the  folklore,  which  was 
abundant. 

At  the  end  of  their  seventh  year  boys  were  removed 

from  the  care  of  their  mothers  and  nurses  and  sent  to^ 

I 

school.     Going  to  school  meant  a  great  deal  more  iui 


BEFORE  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  65 

those  days  than  it  usually  means  in  ours.  It  meant  th,^ 
beginning  of  an  entirely  new  kind  of  life — viz.,  political 
life.  Greek  schools  were  burgher-schools  {Bilrger- 
schulen)  in  a  very  strict  sense;  and  though  the  state 
did  not  provide  them  or  (in  Athens  at  least)  compel 
any  one  to  attend  them,  it  oversaw  them  and  used 
them  for  its  purposes — that  is,  for  the  training  of 
citizens  in  all  political  and  social  (that  is,  diagogic) 
activities.  In  school,  boys  were  thrown  into  a  sort  of 
preparatory  public  life ;  for  the  music  school  and  the 
palestra  were  to  them  what  the  agora  and  the  gymna- 
sium were  to  grown  men  :  their  daily  life  was  spent  in 
them.  Leaving  home  at  daybreak,  and  with  almost 
no  clothing,  the  boys,  each  accompanied  by  his  peda- 
gogue, assembled  at  some  appointed  spot,  and  thence 
walked  through  the  streets,  in  rank  and  file,  to  school. 
It  seems  that  freeborn  boys  and  girls  were  not  per- 
mitted to  walk  in  the  streets  without  attendants.  The 
pedagogue,  usually  an  aged  and  worn-out  slave,  though 
not  expected  to  impart  to  his  ward  any  literary  instruc- 
tion, nevertheless  played  a  great  part  in  his  education, 
being  his  guardian  and  monitor  during  the  whole  of 
the  time  that  he  was  not  immediately  under  the  eye  of 
his  parents  and  teachers — that  is,  while  he  was  on  his 
way  to  and  from  school  and  during  his  hours  of  recre- 
ation and  play,  which  were  not  short.  There  can  be 
little  doubt  that  a  boy's  moral  training  depended  in 
large  degree  upon  the  character  of  his  pedagogue,  and 
that,  as  this  was  not  always  of  the  highest,  many  suf- 
fered in  consequence. 

It  is  not  easy  to  determine  how  the  daily  programme 
of  an  Athenian  school  was  arranged ;  but  it  is  not  un- 
K    likely  that  the  younger  boys  went  to  the  palaestra  in 


i 


ee        EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

the  morning  and  to  the  music-school  in  the  afternoon, 
while  the  older  boys  did  the  reverse.  Assuming  this, 
we  shall  follow  the  younger  boys  through  a  day.  Ar- 
rived at  the  palsestra,  they  salute  the  training-master, 
pay  their  respects  to  Hermes,  the  patron  deity  of  physi- 
cal culture,  whose  statue  and  altar  occupy  a  promi- 
nent place,  and  then  begin  their  exercises.  These 
are  suited  to  the  age  of  the  boys,  and  are  therefore 
neither  violent  nor  complicated.  Their  aim  is  to  de- 
velop all  the  faculties  of  the  body  in  a  harmonious 
way,  and  to  make  it  the  ready  and  effective  instru- 
ment of  the  will.  No  attempt  is  made  to  impart  the 
athletic  habit.  The  exercises  consist  of  (1)  running, 
(2)  leaping,  (3)  discus-throwing,  (4)  javelin-casting, 
(5)  wrestling.  The  first  two  are  meant  to  exercise  the 
legs,  the  second  two  the  arms  and  eye,  the  last  the 
whole  body  and  the  temper.  These  exercises  are 
varied  with  lessons  in  dancing  and  deportment,  whose 
purpose  is  to  impart  ease,  grace,  and  dignity  to  every 
attitude  and  movement,  and  to  do  away  with  awkward- 
ness, forwardness,  and  bashfulness.  A  good  deal  of 
time  also  is  given  up  to  play,  during  which  the  boy? 
are  allowed  considerable  freedom,  and  enjoy  excellent 
opportunities  for  learning  the  principles  of  concerted 
action  and  of  justice.  In  this  way  the  forenoon  is 
spent.  About  noon  there  is  a  recess,  during  which 
the  boys  partake  of  a  simple  meal  brought  them  by 
their  pedagogues.*    After  this  the  boys  are  marched 

*  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  this  was  the  custom  in  the  olden 
time,  although,  so  far  as  I  know,  there  is  no  express  statement  in 
any  ancient  author  on  the  subject.  At  a  later  time,  if  we  may 
judge  from  certain  implied  reproaches  in  Xenophon's  Ediicaiion 
of  Cyrus,  the  boys  went  home  to  lunch,  and  often  received  im- 


BEFORE  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  67 

f  in  order  to  the  music-school.  Here,  after  saluting  the 
master,  and  uttering  a  beief  invocation  to  the  Muses 
and  Apollo,  whose  statues  adorn  the  schoolroom,  they 
begin  their  mental  gymnastics.  These  consist  of  sing- 
ing, playing  on  the  lute  (KiOapis),  writing,  and  reading. 
The  boys  sit  on  the  ground  or  on  low  benches,  while 
the  teacher,  armed  with  a  rod,  occupies  an  elevated 
seat.  The  exercises  open  with  patriotic  songs.  The 
first  is  a  religious  song  celebrating  Zeus,  Athena,  or 
some  great  deity,  and  is  sung  in  unison  to  a  simple, 
old-fashioned  Doric  air ;  and  the  boys  are  encouraged 
to  throw  all  the  fire  they  can  into  both  words  and 
music.  This  is  followed  by  a  war-song  recalling  some 
great  national  victory,  and  is  rendered  in  the  same 
spirit.  Then  follow  other  songs  of  different  kinds, 
but  all  simple  and  strong,  appealing  to  patriotic  and 
ethical  emotions  quite  as  much  as  to  the  musical  sense. 
After  the  singing  comes  the  lesson  on  the  lute,  in 
which  the  boys  learn  to  play  the  airs  to  which  their 
songs  are  sung.  After  the  lute-playing  comes  the  ^ 
instruction  in  letters  (ypa/x/tara).  Each  boy  holds  in  [ 
his  hands  a  wax-covered  tablet,  or  rather  a  pair  of  •: 
folding  tablets,  and  a  stylus.  These  tablets  contain 
the  writing  lesson  of  yesterday,  which  is  the  reading 
lesson  of  to-day.  The  boys  go  up  in  turn  to  the 
master,  who  punctuates  the  writing  for  them — that  is, 
separates  words  and  clauses  (Stao-rtC")  * — and  then  the 

proper  food  from  overindulgent  mothers.  It  does  not  seem 
that  at  any  time  the  training-master  exercised  any  supervision 
over  the  eating  and  drinking  of  his  pupils,  this  being  probably 
left  to  the  parents  and  pedagogues.  At  this  time  the  Greeks 
were  a  temperate  people,  so  that  no  special  training  in  dietetic 
hygiene  was  necessary. 

*  1  am  supposing  that  the  boys  we  are  following  have  already 


68        EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

reading  begins.  The  first  effort  of  the  master  is  to 
make  the  boys  read  without  stumbling  or  hesitancy 
(dSiaTTTwro)?) ;  having  accomplished  this,  he  proceeds 
to  make  them  read  with  due  regard  to  expression, 
prosody,  and  pauses  (KaO*  VTroKpicriv^  Kara  TrpoawSuiVy 
Kara  Staa-ToXrjv),  and  only  after  this  has  been  done  to 
his  satisfaction  does  the  reading-lesson  close,  when  the 
boys  are  reminded  that  they  are  expected  to  commit 
the  whole  to  memory  against  exhibition-day.  Other 
tablets  are  now  produced,  and  the  writing-lesson  be- 
gins. This  is  at  the  same  time  a  dictation-lesson,  for 
the  boys  write  down  what  the  master  recites.  With 
this  the  session  closes,  the  rest  of  the  day  till  sunset 
being  devoted  to  play  under  the  eye  of  the  pedagogues, 
who  at  last  see  their  wards  safely  home  before  the 
streets  are  dark.) 

It  is  not  pretended  that  the  above  picture  is  cor- 
rect in  every  particular  ;  but,  on  the  whole,  I  believe 
it  fairly  represents  the  daily  life  of  an  Athenian  school- 
boy between  the  ages  of  seven  and  eleven.  The  above 
programme  may  seem  to  us  rather  meagre.  There  is 
no  arithmetic,  no  grammar,  no  geography,  no  draw- 
ing, no  physical  science,  no  manual  training  —  only 
physical  exercise,  dancing,  singing,  playing,  reading, 
and  writing.  And  yet,  if  we  examine  the  programme 
carefully,  we  shall  see  that  it  was  admirably  adapted  to 
the  end  in  view,  which  was  to  make  strong,  well-bal- 
anced,  worthy,  patriotic  citizens^  capable,  through  bodi- 
ly  strength,  courage,  social  motive,  and  intelligence,  of 
meeting  every'"^tnergei!?y  of  civil  and   military  life. 

learned  to  write  all  the  letters  and  syllables.  This  they  usually 
did  on  boxes  of  sand  or  on  sand  strewed  on  the  ground.    The 


BEFORE  THE  EISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  69 

The  first  thing  that  strikes  one  about  it  is  that  it  aims 
at  developing  capacity  and  not  at  imparting  accom- 
plishments or  knowledge.  Its  purpose  is  to  put  the 
pupil  in  complete  possession  of  his  bodily  and  mental 
powers,  so  that  he  may  be  ready  to  exert  them  wisely 
in  relation  to  anything  that  may  present  itself.  Such 
self-possession  was  called  by  the  Greeks  KoXoKayadCa^ 
fair-and-goodness,  the  "fair"  applying  to  the  body, 
and  the  "  good  "  to  the  soul.  Again,  if  we  look  at  the 
intellectual  part  of  the  programme,  we  shall  find  that 
it  is  not  so  meagre  after  all.  The  poetry  which  forms 
the  -matter  of  it  holds  in  solution  a  whole  world  of 
valuable  experience  and  moral  example,  which  it  only 
requires  a  good  instructor  to  bring  out.  J-'he^ioetry 
of  Greece  was  its  religious  and  ethical  lore ;  Homer 
and  Hesiod  were  its  Bible.  In  learning  this  poetry, 
therefore,  boys  were  imbibing  the  very  essence  of  the 
national  life,  the  inner  spirit,  of  which  its  history  and 
institutions  were  but  the  external  embodiment.  There 
are  two  things  which  the  Greeks  recognized  far  better 
4ihan  we  do  :  (1)  the  educational  yalno  of  true  poetry, 
and  (2)  the  ethical  influence  of  works  which  present 
in  ^^Ts^  "f^T'rn  fl^^  p^i(;Tp]^i,  ff^lig^^^^a  and  political, 
of  a  people's  life.  -We  are  inclined  to  be  content  if  we 
can  get  information  rapidly  and  easily  into  the  heads 
of  our  pupils,  and  trouble  ourselves  very  little  about 
the  manner  in  which  this  is  accomplished.  The 
Greeks  were  wiser.)  They  knew  that  the  how  is  more 
important  than  the  what ;  that  conceptions  which  are 
presented  to  the  mind  clothed  in  poetic  light  and 
heat  are  far  more  readily  assimilated  and  retained,  and 
exercise  a  far  deeper  and  more  lasting  influence  upon 
the  imagination,  the  feelings,  and  the  will,  than  those 


70         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

which  come  to  it  in  the  cold,  gray  garb  of  ordinary 
prose.  They  knew  that  to  accustom  the  mind  to  a 
poetic  way  of  conceiving  things,  and  of  expressing  its 
conceptions  in  the  forms  of  language,  is  far  better  than 
to  crowd  it  with  any  number  of  facts,  however  useful. 
The  truth  is,  the  world  at  bottom  is  poetical,  and  un- 
less we  can  see  it  poetically  we  do  not  see  it  as  it  is. 
y^  Again  we  are  inclined  to  think  that  any  piece  of 
writing  is  good  enough  to  put  in  a  reading-book  for 
schools,  provided  it  is  free  from  grammatical  errors 
and  interesting  or  amusing.  "  The  One-horse  Shay  " 
or  "  The  Owl  and  the  Pussy-cat"  does  just  as  well  as 
"  The  Landing  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers."  In  this  again 
the  Greeks  were  wiser  than  we.  From  the  time  when 
their  sons  began  to  read,  the  great  literary  works  of  the 
nation  were  placed  in  their  hands,  and  the  thoughts 
and  ideals  which  had  shaped  the  institutions  of  the 
state  made  familiar  to  their  thoughts  and  imagina- 
tions. Such  was  the  richness  of  these  works  that  there 
is  hardly  any  branch  of  ordinary  education  recognized 
at  the  present  day  that  might  not  easily  be  brought 
into  fruitful  and  elevating  connection  with  them.* 
And  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  in  the  hands  of  good 
teachers  they  were  made  the  basis  not  only  of  ethical 
instruction,  but  also  of  history,  geography,  grammar, 
and  many  other  things. 

If  now  we  should  follow  one  of  the  older  boys 
through  his  exercises  for  a  day,  we  should  not  find 
that  they  differed  greatly  from  those  of  the  younger 

*  Greek  literature  was  admirably  adapted  for  educational 
purposes ;  but  English  is  not  one  whit  behind  it.  What  a  glori- 
ous day  for  English  and  American  education  it  will  be  when  the 
school-books  are  the  Bible,  Shakespeare,  Scott,  and  Tennyson  ! 


BEFORE  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  71 

boys,  except  in  being  more  advanced  and  in  demand- 
ing more  continuous  and  vigorous  exertion.  The 
races,  the  leaps,  the  throws  of  discus  and  javelin,  be- 
come longer;  wrestling  becomes  more  complicated 
and  energetic,  and  occupies  more  time  than  formerly. 
Preparation  is  going  on  to  meet  the  dangers  of  the 
approaching  age  of  puberty.  The  poetry  and  music 
are  of  a  higher  order ;  the  literary  lessons  are  longer, 
treat  of  higher  and  more  abstruse  subjects,  and  are 
made  the  basis  for  more  difficult  studies.  Arithmetic 
is  now  introduced,  and  some  elementary  instruction 
given  in  astronomy.  When  the  age  of  puberty  arrives, 
a  marked  change  is  made  in  the  studies.  More  time 
than  before  is  devoted  to  physical  training,  while  the 
intellectual  exercises  assume  a  more  practical  turn. 
Every  eHort  is  made  to  fill  the  time  of  the  boys  with 
vigorously  active  occupations,  to  turn  their  attention 
outward,  away  from  themselves  and  their  own  feelings 
and  toward  things  to  be  done.  Emulation,  which  al- 
ways played  a  principal  part  in  everything  Greek,  is 
now  allowed  to  have  its  full  effect,  and  superiority  in 
any  study  rewarded  with  all  that  is  dear  to  the  heart 
of  a  boy.  And  this  leads  us  to  the  matter  of  school 
exhibitions. 

We  have  already  seen  that  physical  training  was 
under  the  patronage  of  Hermes,  while  music  and  let- 
ters were  under  that  of  Apollo  and  the  Muses.  Now, 
since  such  patronage  always  implied  worship,  certain 
days  were  set  apart  in  all  the  schools  for  this  purpose. 
The  palsestras  celebrated  the  Herm^a  ("Epfxaia) ;  the 
music  schools,  the  Musea  (Movo-cta).  At  these  festivals 
the  religious  service  consisted  of  competitive  exercises 
on  the  part  of  the 'pupils,  closing  with  a  sacrifice.     By 


72         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

a  law  of  Solon's  the  school  buildings  and  grounds  were 
at  these  times,  as  at  all  others,  rigorously  closed  against 
grown  persons,  and  any  one  who  entered  was  liable  to 
the  penalty  of  death.  Thus  the  only  spectators,  besides 
the  teachers  and  their  families,  were  the  impartial  gods. 
Before  the  sacrifice  the  successful  competitors  were 
crowned  with  wreaths,  and  were  the  heroes  of  the  oc- 
casion, being  regarded  as  the  special  favorites  of  the 
patron  gods,  whom  they  had  proved  themselves  to  have 
worthily  served ;  for  all  worth  or  excellence  was  re- 
garded as  a  mark  of  divine  favor,  and  its  manifestation 
a  part  of  divine  service. 

About  the  age  of  sixteen^the  Athenian  boy  finished 
his  school  life^^^his'wa^a  most  important  event  in 
his  career ;  for  now  he  passed,  in  great  measure,  out 
of  the  hands  of  his  parents  into  those  of  the  state, 
which  undertook  to  complete  his  education  and  pre- 
pare him  for  citizenship.  'It  is  a  curious  fact  that,  in 
spite  of  all  the  recommendations  of  philosophers  and 
the  example  of  Sparta,  Athens  never  had  any  S3^stem 
of  public  instruction,  except  what  was  needed  as  a 
direct  preparation  for  civil  and  military  service.  Wise- 
ly, I  can  not  but  think,  she  refused,  by  a  socialistic 
system  of  public  schools,  to  relieve  parents  from  the 
duty  of  educating  their  children,  a  duty  which  they 
had  undertaken  in  bringing  them  into  the  world.  At 
the  same  time,  she  recognized  perfectly  well  her  duty 
to  her  children  and  future  citizens  by  imposing  certain 
disabilities  upon  parents  who  failed  to  educate  their 
sons,  and  by  making  inaccessible  to  uneducated  boys 
the  instruction  necessary  to  prepare  them  for  the 
higher  duties  of  citizenship. 

It  seems  to  me  probable  that  state-education  for 


BEFORE  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  73 

state-purposes  originated  with  Solon,  who  did  so  much 
for  the  culture  of  his  fellow-countrymen.  It  was  he 
who  built  the  first  gymnasia  at  Athens,  the  Academy 
to  the  northwest  of  the  city,  and  Cynosarges  to  the 
east,  the  former  as  a  resort  for,  full-blooded  citizens, 
the  latter  for  those  whose  blood  contained  a  foreign 
admixture.  These  gymnasia  played  an  important  part 
in  the  life  of  the  people.  They  were  not  only  public 
parks  and  exercise-grounds  where  the  citizens  spent  a 
good  deal  of  their  time,  but  they  were  also  state  edu- 
cational institutions,  subserving,  in  an  unobtrusive 
way  the  interests  of  aristocracy.  While  no  young  man 
born  of  free  parents  was  excluded  from  them,  yet,  in- 
asmuch as  no  one  was  fitted  to  enter  who  had  not  re- 
ceived a  careful  previous  education  in  school  and 
palaestra,  their  benefits  were  practically  confined  to  the 
sons  of  cultured  and  well-to-do  families ;  and  since 
only  those  young  men  who  had  taken  a  full  state- 
course  of  instruction  in  the  gymnasia  were  eligible  to 
the  higher  state-pffices,  the  result  of  the  establishment 
of  these  institutions  was  to  confine  these  offices  to 
members  of  such  families.  So  long,  therefore,  as  the 
constitution  of  Solon  remained  in  force,  the  state- 
gymnasia  formed  a  barrier  against  the  rising  tide  of 
democracy. 

When  a  boy  was  admitted  to  a  public  gymnasium, 
though  still  regarded  as  a  minor,  he  obtained  a  sudden 
/and  often  perilous  accession  of  liberty.  He  was  no 
longer  accompanied  by  his  pedagogue  when  he  went 
abroad,  but  was  free  to  go  where  he  liked — to  lounge 
in  the  Greets  or  the  agora,  to  choose  his  own  com- 
panions, and  to  be  present  at  whatever  was  going  on 
in  the  city.     A  good  deal  of  his  time  was  no  doubt 


71         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

spent  in  his  gymnasium,  in  physical  exercises,  and  in 
pleasant  walks  and  talks  with  companions  of  his  own 
age  and  with  older  men.  The  exercises  were  now  what 
was  known  as  the  pentathlon,  consisting  of  running, 
leaping,  discus-throwing,  wrestling,  and  boxing.  They 
were  superintended  by  a  state-officer  (yv/xvao-r/Js  or 
aAetVnys),  who  saw  to  it  that  they  were  conducted  in 
the  most  vigorous  manner.  Before  the  wrestling-les- 
son began,  the  young  men  were  rubbed  over  with  oil 
and  bestrewed  with  fine  sand,  and  then  began  a  wild 
struggle,  literally  in  the  dirt ;  for  care  was  taken  to 
teach  them  that,  when  occasion  demanded,  they  must 
not  be  afraid  of  soiling  their  hands  or  even  their  whole 
bodies.*  When  the  lesson  was  over  they  scraped 
themselves  with  a  strigil,  took  a  cold  bath,  were  again 
anointed,  and  then  rested,  exposing  their  naked  bodies 
to  the  sun,  till  the  skin  became  of  a  light  chestnut 
color. f  The  boxing  lessons  seem  to  have  been  con- 
ducted in  a  way  not  unworthy  of  the  modern  prize- 
ring.  It  hardly  needs  to  be  remarked  that  all  the 
exercises  in  the  gymnasia  were  public,  a  fact  which 
was  enough  to  deter  weaker  men  from  taking  part  in 
them,  and  to  encourage  the  stronger  ones  to  do  their 
best. 

It  is  a  curious  circumstance  that  during  the  years 

*  See  the  graphic  account  in  the  beginning  of  Lucian's  AncL- 
charsis :  "  They  are  mixed  up  in  the  dirt,  rolling  about  like  pigs  " 
(iy  Ty  TTTjAy  (Twava^vpoyrou,  KvXiv^ovfieyoi  Sxnrep  tries),  and  more  to 
the  same  effect. 

f  This  curious  practice  enables  us  to  account  for  the  color  on 
the  bodies  of  certain  recently  discovered  painted  statues,  and 
also  for  the  sneers  of  Aristophanes  at  the  pale  complexions  {rohs 
axpMvras,  Clouds,  104)  of  the  pupils  of  Socrates. 


BEFOKE  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  75 

when  young  men  were  attending  the  public  gymnasia 
no  intellectual  instruction,  not  even  a  course  in  po- 
litical science,  was  provided  for  them.  The  explana- 
tion of  this  clearly  is  that  they  were  expected  to  acquire 
all  that  was  necessary  from  attending  courts,  public 
meetings,  etc.,  and  from  contact,  in  the  gymnasia  and 
agora,  with  older  men.  The  truth  is  that  in  Athens 
what  we  should  call  college-education  was  imparted 
directly  by  the  state  through  its  ordinary  functions. 
Thus  her  young  men,  instead  of  attending  classes  in 
political  science,  gave  their  attention  to  the  practical 
application  of  political  principles  in  the  daily  life  of 
the  state. 

The  gymnastic  training  of  the  young  Athenian 
lasted  for  two  years.  At  the  age  of  eighteen,  if  he  had 
worthily  acquitted  himself,  he  graduated,  taking  the 
degree  of  cadet  (eiprj^o^)^  and.  passed  out  of  the  control 
of  his  parents  into  that  of  the  state.  This  transition 
was  accompanied  with  an  impressive  ceremony.  His 
father,  having  proved  from  the  records  of  his  phratry 
that  he  was  the  lawful  child  of  free  parents,  had  his 
name  enrolled  in  the  register  of  his  demos,  and  the 
youth  became  a  member  of  it.  Thereafter,  furnished 
with  the  necessary  credentials,  he  presented  himself  to 
the  so-called  king-arch  on  (apx^v  ^ao-cAcvs),  and  asked 
to  be  introduced  to  the  people  as  a  citizen.  He  now 
cut  off  the  long  hair  which  he  had  previously  worn, 
and  put  on  the  black  dress  which  marked  the  citizen. 
At  the  first  public  meeting  held  thereafter  the  archon 
introduced  him,  in  company  with  others,  to  the  whole 
people.  Hereupon,  armed  with  spear  and  shield  (the 
gift  of  the  state,  if  he  was  the  orphan  son  of  a  father 
who  had  fallen  in  battle),  he  proceeded  to  the  temple 


76         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

of  Aglauros,  whicli  overlooked  the  agora,  the  greater 
part  of  the  city,  and  a  large  portion  of  the  territory  of 
the  state,  and  here  took  the  following  oath,  prescribed 
by  Solon :  "  I  will  never  disgrace  these  sacred  arms, 
nor  desej-t  my  companion  in  the  ranks.  I  will  fight 
for  temples  and  public  property,  both  alone  and  with 
many.  I  will  transmit  my  fatherland,  not  only  not 
less,  but  greater  and  better,  than  it  was  transmitted  to 
me.  I  will  obey  the  magistrates  who  may  at  any  time 
be  in  power.  I  will  observe  both  the  existing  laws  and 
those  which  the  people  may  unanimously  hereafter 
make,  and  if  any  person  seek  to  annul  the  laws  or  set 
them  at  naught,  I  will  do  my  best  to  prevent  him,  and 
will  defend  them  both  alone  and  with  many.  I  will 
honor  the  religion  of  my  fathers.  And  I  call  to  wit- 
ness Aglauros,  Enyalios,  Ares,  Zeus,  Thallo,  Auxo,  and 
Hegemone." 

But  though  after  this  the  young  men  were  full  citi- 
zens, they  were  not  permitted  to  exercise  all  the  func- 
tions of  such.  For  two  years  more  they  were  regarded 
as  novices,  and  took  no  part  in  civic  duties,  being  com- 
pelled to  live  outside  the  city,  to  garrison  fortresses, 
and  to  act  as  patrolmen  and  country  police.  Their 
life  at  this  time  was  that  of  soldiers  in  war,  and 
woe  to  them  if  they  showed  any  cowardice  or  weak- 
ness !  If  during  the  two  years  they  came  up  to  the 
required  standard  of  manhood,  and  passed  the  man- 
hood examination  (So/ci/wio-ia  cis  avSpas),  they  received 
the  degree  of  Athenian  man,*  returned  to  live  in  the 

*  Pubhc  speakers  always  addressed  the  citizens  by  this  title 
(^AvSpes  'A6rjpa7oi,  Athenian  men),  which  is  quite  different  from 
simple  "  Athenians  "  (5  "Adrjviuoi), 


BEFORE  THE  RISE  OP  PHILOSOPHY.  Y7 

city,  and  began  to  exercise  all  the  duties  of  citizenship. 
Their  university,  their  alma  mater — and  they  attended 
it  for  the  rest  of  their  lives — was  the  state ;  their  cur- 
riculum, their  civic  duties.  During  the  earlier  years 
of  their  civic  life  their  time  was  pretty  fully  occupied 
with  practical  duties — administrative, judicial, military; 
but  as  they  approached  the  age  of  fifty  they  enjoyed 
more  leisure,  which  they  devoted  to  Staywy?/,  this  being 
regarded  as  the  crown  and  just  reward  of  a  well-spent 
life. 

Such,  in  its  general  outlines,  was  the  scheme  of 
Athenian  education  in  the  centuries  which  preceded 
the  Persian  war  and  the  rise  of  philosophy,  and  it  may 
be'  taken  as  the  type  of  Greek  education  generally  dur- 
ing that  time.  Those  great  educational  differences 
which  in  subsequent  times  fixed  so  wide  a  gulf  between 
Athens  on  the  one  hand,  and  Thebes  and  Sparta  on 
the  other,  existed  as  yet  but  in  embryo.  How  valuable 
this  scheme  was,  and  how  well  adapted  to  its  purpose, 
was  shown  to  all  the  world  on  the  fields  of  Marathon 
and  Plataeaj  and  in  the  Gulf  of  Salamis,  when  it  broke 
the  power  of  Oriental  despotism  forever  and  laid  the 
foundations  of  human  freedom- 


CHAPTER  IV. 


There  is  no  date  in  Greek  history  upon  which  we 
can  put  a  finger  and  say,  Here  philosophy  began.  The 
progress  from  unreflective  to  reflective  thought  was 
slow  and  laborious,  and  the  latter  did  not  appear  until 
it  was  called  for  by  new  social  relations  for  which  the 
former  was  found  to  be  inadequate.  Like  every  other 
great  spiritual  product  which  gave  lustre  to  Greek  civ- 
ilization, philosophy  took  its  first  steps,  not  in  Greece 
proper,  but  in  those  of  her  colonies  which  came  in  con- 
tact with  civilizations  different  from  hers — in  Ionia 
first,  and  in  Magna  Graecia  afterward — and  all  the 
philosophers  before  Socrates  belong  to  one  or  the  other 
of  these  re^rions.  Just  what  the  circumstances  were 
which  first  made  men  feel  that  the  old,  simple,  myth- 
ical explanation  of  the  origin  and  order  of  the  world 
was  unsatisfactory,  and  forced  them  to  look  about  for 
another,  we  can  not  tell  with  certainty ;  but  there  are 
some  reasons  for  concluding  that  among  them  was  that 
confusion  of  myths  which  arose  out  of  the  attempt  to 
unite  religions  of  widely  diverse  character — attempts 
which  could  hardly  fail  to  be  made  in  the  regions 
above  referred  to.  Not  seldom  does  a  conflict  between 
rival  claims  result  in  the  rejection  of  both,  and  the 
putting  forward  of  a  new  claimant.    And  so  it  hap- 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  79 

pened  in  this  instance.    In  the  conflict  of  mythologies 
— Greek,  Lydian,  Persian,  Phoenician,  etc. — mythology 

.  came  gradually  to  be  discredited  and  to  be  superseded 

-by  philosophy. 

We  have  seen  that  in  the  eaHier  stages  of  social 
existence  life  rested  upon  a  religious  consciousness — 
that  is,  upon  a  strong,  unreasoned  feeling  of  the  soli- 
darity of  the  family,  phratry,  tribe,  etc.  We  have  also 
seen  that  this  solidarity  originally  included  the  dead 
as  well  as  the  living  members  of  the  social  body,  and, 
being  supposed  to  depend  upon  community  of  blood, 
gave  occasion  to  sacrificial  rites,  which  were  merely  a 
means  of  maintaining  and  strengthening  it.  W^e  have 
seen,  still  further,  that  these  rites  were  continued  long 
after  their  meaning  was  forgotten  and  the  worship  of 
nature-powers  had  replaced  that  of  ancestors,  nay,  even 
after  nature  powers  had  given  way  before  ideal  moral 
personalities.  With  each  of  these  substitutions,  of 
course,  religious  rites  assumed  a  new  meaning.  The 
rise  of  nature-powers  gave  birth  to  mythology ;  that  of 
moral  personalities  to  ethical  allegory  and  Orphic  the- 
osophy.  But,  despite  all  such  changes,  the  rites  per- 
sisted, and  life  continued  to  rest  upon  a  sense  of  soli- 
darity between  the  individual  and  his  social  and 
ph3^sical  environment,  a  sense  which  is  the  origin  of 
all  religion.  Moreover,  in  proportion  as  the  true 
meaning  of  religious  rites  was  forgotten,  the  rites 
themselves  came  to  be  invested  with  an  atmosphere 
of  mystery,  which  gave  them  a  vague  and  awesome  im- 
pressiveness,  such  as  no  amount  of  clear  meaning  could 
have  imparted  to  them.  It  was  in  this  way  that  re- 
ligion, which  originally  had  nothing  to  do  with  ethics, 
came  to  furnish  ethical  sanctions,  and  to  be  regarded 
7 


80         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

as  something  against  which  it  was  impious  to  utter  a 
word.  In  brief,  the  sacredness  of  religious  observances 
and  beliefs  is  in  great  measure  due  to  their  mysteri- 
ousness. 

Xow,  as  long  as  there  is  no  conflict  of  religious  ob- 
servances and  of  beliefs  connected  with  them,  they  are 
found  to  f\irnish  very  strong  sanctions  for  external 
morality ;  but  let  a  conflict  arise,  and  their  influence  is 
gone,  and  then  other  sanctions  must  be  sought  for. 
These  new  sanctions,  generally  speaking,  can  be  found 
only  through  reflection — that  is,  philosophy.  Such  is 
the  origin  of  Greek  philosophy.  Of  course,  the  passage 
from  religion  to  philosophy  is  gradual,  and  the  latter 
is  long  in  finding  out  what  its  implications  are.  It 
was  not  till  Socrates  came  that  Greek  philosophy 
really  became  conscious  of  what  it  meant ;  and  then, 
naturally  enough,  religion  tried  to  abolish  it  in  his 
person. 

The  aim  of  what  has  been  said  thus  far  is  to  bring 
out  the  fact  that,  with  the  rise  and  growth  of  philoso- 
phy, life  loses  its  old  religious  basis  and  seeks  to  find 
another  through  reflection.  But  religion,  being  at  bot- 
tom a  sense  of  solidarity,  which  is  the  fundamental 
bond  of  society,  when  this  sense  is  gone,  society  is  lia- 
ble to  fall  to  pieces,  unless  a  bond  of  equal  strength 
can  be  found  in  philosophy.  And  it  is  long  before 
this  can  be  done.  Reflection  in  its  infancy  turns  to 
the  physical  world,  to  which,  indeed,  the  old  gods  be- 
long, and  there,  apart  from  gods,  it  finds  no  moral 
sanctions — nothing  calculated  to  hold  society  together. 
It  is  only  long  afterward,  when  it  turns  its  attention 
inward  to  the  spiritual  world,  that  it  discovers  the  true 
bond,  which  is  no  longer  one  of  blood  or  land,  but  one 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPJ^^'         ^'^ 

of  intellect  and  will ;  and  it  is  only  then  that  m'O.'  ^^  ' 
pass  from  natural  to  moral  life  and  religion. 

We  need  not,  then,  be  in  the  least  surprised  wlien^ 
we  find  that  the  first  effect  of  reflective  thought  was 
to  loosen  the  old  bonds  of  society  and  reduce  it  to  its 
constituent  atoms,  or  individuals,  for  individual  is 
only  the  Latin  rendering  of  the  Greek  atom  {aTOfiov). 
In  a  word,  philosophy  gave  rise  to  individualism.  Nor 
is  this  wonderful ;  for  one  chief  difference  between 
unreflectivo  and  reflective  thought  is  this :  the  former 
is  race-thought,  the  latter  individual  thought,  and 
each  tends  to  preserve  its  own  subject  and  to  invest 
it  with  importance.  The  struggle  between  the  two 
kinds  of  thought  was  long  and  fierce,  and  did  not — 
indeed,  could  not — close  until  men  discovered  that 
neither  the  one  nor  the  other  was  true  by  itself,  but 
that  the  two  had  to  combine  in  universal  or  divine 
thought.  We  can  well  sympathize  with  Heraclitua 
when,  seeing  the  social  ravages  of  individualism,  he 
exclaims  :  "  Though  reason  (Xoyos)  is  universal,  the 
mass  of  men  live  as  if  each  had  a  private  wisdom  of 
his  own ! "  In  the  midst  of  this  struggle  ancient 
society,  with  its  material  ties,  fell  to  pieces,  and  the 
world  has  been  struggling  ever  since  to  replace  it  by  a 
social  order  bound  together  by  spiritual,  that  is,  eth- 
ical, ones. 

The  same  contact  with  foreign  peoples  which  gave 
the  impulse  to  reflective  thought  among  the  Greeks 
also  brought  about  that  ever-memorable  conflict  which 
first  made  Greece  conscious  of  her  own  mission,  lifted 
her  to  a  new  grade  of  civilization,  and  made  necessary 
an  ethical  social  bond.  When,  after  the  second  Persian 
war,  Athens  assumed  the  hegemony  of  Greece,  and  sud- 


80         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

as  soT^iound  herself  compelled  to  deal  with  a  large  niim- 
wn  of  confederate  states,  she  confronted  a  problem  for 
which  her  political  experience  and  principles  had  not 
prepared  her — the  problem  of  how  to  combine  with 
her  associates  into  a  larger  and  stronger  political  unity. 
What  shall  be  the  bond  of  this  unity  ?  was  now  the 
vital  question  ;  and  Athens  returned  the  wrong  answ^er. 
Instead  of  seeking  to  introduce  an  ethical  bond  be- 
tween herself  and  her  associated  commonwealths,  to 
be  merelj  prima  inter  pares,  and  so  to  pave  the  way 
for  a  United  States  of  Greece,  she  tried  to  reduce  them 
to  a  condition  of  material  dependence,  and  in  the  end 
ruined  both  herself  and  them.  But  the  principles 
which  she  had  refused  to  apply  in  order  to  found  a 
social  order  deserving  to  absorb  and  supersede  her 
own,  were  all  the  while  at  work  in  her  own  body, 
slowly  but  surely  accomplishing  its  dissolution.  In- 
dividualism was  shaping  itself  into  democracy,  which 
was  entirely  incompatible  with  the  existence  of  the 
ancient  state.  Democracy  requires  a  moral  bond,  and 
the  ancient  state  had  only  a  material-  one. 
^  The  spirit  of  individualism,  fostered  by  reflective 
thought,  showed  itself  now^here  sooner  than  in  educa- 
tion. Aristotle  says :  "  When  they  (our  ancestors)  be- 
gan to  enjoy  leisure  for  thought,  as  the  result  of  easy 
circumstances,  and  to  cherish  more  exalted  ideas  with 
respect  to  worth,  and  especially  when,  in  the  period 
before  and  after  the  Persian  wars,  they  came  to  enter- 
tain a  high  opinion  of  themselves  on  account  of  their 
achievements,  they  pursued  all  kinds  of  education, 
making  no  distinction,  but  beating  about  generally." 
The  truth  was,  to  the  new  thought,  not  bounded  by 
the  horizon  of  a  small  state  and  its  round  of  duties, 


\ 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.         ^5 

the  old  education  seemed  narrow  and  meagre,  and, 
like  any  other  novice,  it  grasped  at  everything  that 
came  within  its  reach,  especially  in  states  which,  like 
Athens,  had  no  public  system  of  education.  Thus 
there  arose  a  demand  for  all  kinds  of  knowledge,  for 
polymathy;*  as  the  Greeks  said,  without  any  regard  to 
its  value  for  the  practical  business  of  life — for  knowl- 
edge which,  at  best,  might  serve  the  purposes  of  StaywyiJ, 
now  gradually  coming  to  claim  a  -large  share  in  life. 
This  demand  brought  into  existence  a  class  of  men 
not  hitherto  known  in  Greece — men  who  called  them- 
selves Sophists  ((To<f>L(TT7]^,  one  who  makes  wise)  and 
undertook  to  teach  everything.  To  some  extent  they 
took  the  place  of  the  old  rhapsodes ;  indeed,  they 
might  fitly  enough  be  termed  philosophic  rhapsodes, 
inasmuch  as  they  bore  the  same  relation  to  the  phi- 
losophers who  preceded  them  as  the  rhapsodes  bore  to 
the  epic  poets.  Since  the  days  of  Socrates  the  name 
Sophist  has  had  an  evil  sound,  implying  shallowness 
and  charlatanry;  and  this  is  not  altogether  unjust  to 
the  bearers  of  it.  Nevertheless,  the  Sophists  were  the 
natural  product  of  their  time,  which  was  in  the  main 
responsible  for  their  characteristics.  Their  work  was 
mostly  negative  and  destructive,  but  it  had  to  be  done. 
Their  disorganizing  influence  was  due  not  so  much  to 
their  self-satisfied  foppish  agnosticism  as  to  the  im- 
portance which  they  assigned  to  the  individual  con- 

*  Heraclitus,  who  ©tidently  despised  this,  says :  "  Multitude 
of  knowledge  {TroKvfjLaOlr})  does  not  teach  understanding,  else  it 
would  have  taught  Hesiod  and  Pythagoras,  and  again  Xe- 
nophanes  and  Hecataeus."  The  four  men  here  mentioned  evi- 
dently represent  to  the  Ephesian  the  new  tendency,  which  he 
deplores. 


p^       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

sciousness.  Their  fundamental  tenet,  "  Man  (i.  e.,  the 
individual  man)  is  the  measure  of  all  things,"  expresses 
the  essence  of  indiyidualism.  At  the  same  time,  it  is 
only  a  clear  assertion  of  the  yalidity  of  reflective 
thought,  as  opposed  to  the  unreflective  thought  of  the 
preceding  ages ;  and  it  was  well  that  this  assertion 
should  be  boldly  made.  For  the  first  time  in  the 
world's  history  rationalis^a  became  conscious  of  itself 
and  demanded  a  £eanng. 

For  us  of  the  present  day  it  is  very  difficult  to  con- 
ceive that  the  identification  of  moral  personality  with 
individuality  is  a  thing  of  comparatively  recent  date ; 
that  in  the  earlier  ages  even  of  Greece,  Eome,  and 
Israel  this  had  not  been  accomplished.  And  yet  it  is 
true.  In  those  times  the  moral  personality  was  not 
the  individual,  but  the  social  organism,  the  family  or 
the  state,  as  the  case  might  be.  In  the  old  Hebrew 
commandment  God  is  said  to  "  visit  the  iniquity  of  the 
fathers  upon  the  children  unto  the  third  and  fourth 
generation,"  and  it  is  not  till  the  time  of  Ezekiel,  a 
contemporary  of  Solon's,  when  the  Hebrew  social  or- 
ganism is  in  ruins,  that  we  find  the  announcement : 
"  The  son  shall  not  bear  the  iniquity  of  the  father, 
neither  shall  the  father  bear  the  iniquity  of  the  son  ; 
the  righteousness  of  the  righteous  shall  be  upon  him, 
and  the  wickedness  of  the  wicked  shall  be  upon  him."  * 
If  among  the  Hebrews  this  conviction  was  the  result 
of  social  disorganization,  among  the  Greeks  the  oppo- 
site was  the  case ;  social  disorganization  was  the  result 
of  the  conviction  that  the  individual  stands  for  him- 
self alone. 

*  Ezek.  xviii,  20.    The  whole  of  the  chapter  ought  to  be  read 
in  this  connection. 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  85 

It  is  easy  enough  to  understand  that  such  a  change 
of  view  should  revolutionize  the  whole  life  of  a  people. 
As  long  as  the  social  organism  was  the  moral  person- 
ality, so  long  it  was  the  centre  of  interest  and  effort ; 
but  no  sooner  was  its  place  taken  by  the  individual 
than  all  interest  and  effort  were  transferred  to  him, 
and  the  social  organism,  if  not  neglected,  was  regarded 
as  a  means  of  which  individual  good  was  the  end.  In 
Greece  this  momentous  change  w^as  wrought  mainly 
through  the  Sophists.  From  their  time  Greek  educa- 
tion tended  more  and  more  to  lose  sight  of  the  citizen 
in  the  man  and  to  regard  practical  life  a  mere  means 
to  Siaywy-^.  Let  US  SCO  what  the  immediate  effect  of 
this  was  upon  the  two  acknowledged  branches  of  in- 
struction— gymnastics  and  music. 
"^  In  the  old  time,  as  we  have  seen,  the  aim  of  gym- 
nastics had  been  to  impart  vigor  and  grace  to  the  body, 
so  that  the  pupil  might  perform  his  part  as  a  citizen 
with  energy  and  dignity,  in  war  and  peace.  Now  it 
becomes  more  and  more  a  preparation  for  cultured  lei- 
sure, for  an  easy  self-sufficient  enjoyment,  such  as  men 
were  beginning  to  look  forward  to  in  Elysium,*  but 
which  they  tried  to  anticipate  here  on  earth.  There  is 
a  passage  in  Pindar  which  shows  very  clearly  what  this 
enjoyment  in  his  time  was  expected  to  be.  "  For  them 
below  there  shines  the  might  of  the  sun  during  the 
night  here,  and.  in  meadows  of  purple  roses  their  sub- 

*  The  belief  in  personal  immortality,  with  bliss  or  bale  ac- 
cording to  the  life  here,  did  not,  and  could  not,  become  clear 
until  the  individual  came  to  be  recognized  as  the  moral  person- 
ality. Up  to  that  time  it  was  immortality  for  the  nation  or  the 
family  that  was  coveted.  This  was  notoriously  the  case  among 
ie  Hebrews. 


86         EDUCATION  OF  XIIE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

urban  retreat  is  laden  with  dark  frankincense  and 
golden  fruits.  And  some  delight  themselves  with 
horses  and  gymnastic  exercises,  some  with  draughts, 
and  some  with  lyres,  and  with  them  all  prosperity 
luxuriates  in  full  bloom.  And  through  the  pleasant 
place  a  perfume  is  shed  as  they  forever  mingle  all 
kinds  of  scented  woods  with  far-gleaming  fire  upon 
the  altars  of  the  gods."  It  is  obvious  enough  that 
gymnastics  having  in  view  a  life  of  this  sort,  a  life  of 
aesthetic  enjoyment,  will  be  very  different  from  the 
gymnastics  intended  to  harden  men  for  the  duties  of 
civil  life.  They  will  no  longer  aim  to  make  the  body 
capable  of  the  greatest  amount  of  sustained  exertion, 
but  to  fit  it  for  such  activity  as  shall  give  delight  and 
impart  the  delicious  sense  of  physical  health.  In  a 
word,  their  aim  will  be  subjective,  not  objective;  it 
will  be  feeling,  necessarily  confined  to  the  individual, 
not  action  exerted  for  the  good  of  a  community.  It 
would  be  diflScult  to  overestimate  the  momentousness 
of  this  change. 

Very  similar  was  the  change  that  took  place  in  re- 
gard to  "  music."  In  the  older  period  the  chief  pur- 
pose of  this  branch  of  education  had  been  to  stimulate 
an  intelligent  patriotism  and  to  develop  those  mental 
qualities  which  should  enable  men  to  play  their  part 
worthily  in  all  the  departments  of  domestic  and  civil 
life.  '  Knowledge  for  knowledge'  sake  was  hardly 
dreamed  of.  Now,  on  the  contrary,  though  the  old 
aims  are  by  no  means  forgotten,  new  aims  of  an  en- 
tirely different  sort  come  in,  and  not  only  alter  the 
character  of  the  instruction,  but  call  for  new  sorts  of 
instruction  altogether  unknown  before.  The  strong 
old  patriotic  songs,  with  their  simple  Doric  airs,  played 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  87 

upon  the  simplest  of  instruments — songs  whose  pur-> 
pose  had  been  to  stir  the  heart  with  manly  emotions^ 
which  might  be  ready  for  use  as  motives  when  strenu4 
ous  action  was  demanded — now  gradually  give  way  toj 
languid  or  sentimental  songs  with  complicated  ear-( 
tickling  rhythms,  set  to  Lydian  or  Phrygian  airs  full 
of  trills  and  graces,  and  played  upon  difficult  instru- 
ments requiring  skilful  manipulation.  Such  songs 
and  music  were  calculated  to  fill  with  sweet  delight 
a  passive  mood,  not  to  stir  the  soul  to  deeds  of  worth. 
Aristophanes,  the  inimitably  witty  and  sincere  cham- 
pion of  the  olden  time,  says  that  if  then  "  any  one 
attempted  any  fooling,  or  any  of  those  trills,  like  the 
difficult  inflections  a  la  Phrynis,  now  in  vogue,  he  re- 
ceived a  good  thrashing  for  his  pains,  as  having  in- 
sulted the  Muses,"  the  patrons  of  the  study.  But 
even  Aristophanes's  wit  could  not  counteract  the  new 
tendency.  "  The  cornet,  flute,  harp,  sackbut,  psaltery, 
dulcimer,  and  all  kinds  of  music"  were  introduced 
into  the  schools,*  and  boys  learned  to  play  on  them, 
not  to  develop  in  themselves  worth  for  action,  but  to 
obtain  pleasure  for  themselves,  or  to  make  a  display 
for  the  delectation  of  others.  And  while  this  change 
was  going  on  in  the  case  of  music  proper,  letters, 
which  were  still  classed  along  with  music,  were  fol- 
lowing a  similar  course.  The  old  epic  poets  were  by 
degrees   discarded  as   old-fashioned,  and  their  place 

*  This  was  literally  true ;  see  Aristotle,  Polit.,  viii,  6 ;  1341a 
40  sgg,,  where  are  enumerated  irnKrlSes,  pdpfiiroi,  irrrdyuva,  rpiyuva 
Kol  aafx^vKai,  with  two  etc.,  the  first  covering  those  instruments 
"  that  tend  to  the  pleasure  of  those  using  them  " ;  the  second,  to 
those  "  that  require  manipulatory  science,"  or,  as  we  should  say, 
scientific  manipulation. 


88         EDUCATION  OP  THE  GEEEK  PEOPLE. 

was  taken  by  works  of  a  reflective  and  didactic  sort. 
Gnomic  poetry,  as  it  was  called — that  is,  epigrammatic 
poetry  of  a  sententiously  moral  kind,  such  as  was  writ- 
ten by  Simonides,  Archilochus,  Solon,  and  Theognis — 
came  greatly  into  vogue,*  and  furnished  matter  for 
casuistic  and  hair-splitting  discussions,  which,  while 
they  might  sharpen  the  wits  and  aSord  opportunities 
for  brilliant  intellectual  sword-practice,  were  not  cal- 
culated to  strengthen  the  moral  nature  or  awaken  an 
enthusiasm  for  manly  activity. f  Whereas  the  epic 
poetry  had  turned  the  thoughts  outward  to  the  world 
of  deeds  and  drawn  the  moral  distinctions  in  it,  this 
gnomic  poetry  turned  the  attention  'inward  to  the 
world  of  motives,  and  tried  to  draw  distinctions  among 
them.  ^The  effect  of  this,  of  course,  was  to  foster  re- 
flection instead  of  action.)  And  this  reflection,  once 
roused,  turned  itself  to  the  whole  content  of  the  con- 
sciousness and  to  the  forms  in  which  it  found  expres- 
sion, thus  giving  birth,  in  course  of  time,  to  the  sci- 
jences  of  logic,  rhetoric,  and  grammar,  all  of  which 
I  may  be  said  to  owe  their  origin  to  the  Sophists.  All 
*of  them,  too,  were  sooner  or  later  included  in  the 
school  programme,  which  thus  became  almost  as  varied 
as  that  of  a  modern  school. 

,       Thus  both  branches  of  education   gradually  lost 

jsight  of   their   objective    and  civic   aim, 'which  was 

/worth,  and  drifted  toward 'a  subjective  and  individual 

'  one,  which,  when  it  became  fully  conscious  of  itself-, 

assumed  the  name  of   evSaifiovia,  or  happiness.     But 

*  See  Aristophanes,  Clouds,  1036  sgq. 

f  In  the  first  book  of  Plato's  RepiiUic  (331  E  sqq.)  there  is 
an  example  of  such  discussion,  having  for  its  text  a  gnome  of 
Simonides'  who  is  acknowledged  to  be  a  great  authority. 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  89 

the  individualistic  influence  of  philosophy,*  as  popu- 
larized by  the  Sophists,  was  not  confined  to  the  pa- 
laestra and  the  music-school.  With  these,  indeed,  the 
Sophists  had  comparatively  little  to  do.  Their  chief  at\ 
tention  was  directed  to  the  young  men  who  were  attend-? 
ing  the  public  gymnasia,  or  who,  having  passed  their 
manhood  examination,  were  eager  to  distinguish  them- 
selves in  public  life  or  to  secure  the  conditions  of  hap- 
piness. For  the  moral  and  intellectual  culture  of  these 
two  classes  of  young  men  the  state  had  made  no  special 
provision,  trusting  that  they  would  acquire  whatever  of 
this  sort  was  necessary  or  serviceable  through  daily  con- 
tact with  older  men  and  in  the  exercise  of  the  duties 
of  public  life.  And  this  trust,  on  the  whole,  was  well 
fouruded  as  long  as  the  state  remained  the  chief  object 
of  concern  for  every  citizen ;  but  no  sooner  did  indi- 
vidualism and  the  desire  for  pleasant  diagogic  life 
come  into  competition  with  the  state  than  a  culture 
was  demanded  which  it  had  no  means  j^f  supplying. 
Here  the  Sophists  found  their  opportunity.  The  young 
men  were  to  be  met  everywhere — in  the  streets,  the 
market-place,  the  gymnasia,  the  taverns,  the  homes, 
etc.  The  Sophist  had  only  to  show  himself  in  order 
to  be  surrounded  by  a  knot  of  them.  He  had  but  to 
seat  himself  in  an  exedra,  or  lay  himself  down  under  a 
tree  in  the  gymnasium,  and  they  crowded  round  to 
hear  his  wisdom — his  manifold  stores  of  unfamiliar 
knowledge  and  his  brilliant  arguriients  on  any  theme 
proposed  to  him.     He   was'  soon  far   more  popular 

*  It  should  not  be  forgotten  that  <pi\o<Top(a  (philosophy), 
Pythagoras's  modest  substitute  for  the  older  aocpia  (wisdom), 
originally  included  all  knowledge  not  possessed  by  the  mass  of 
mankind.    Its  technical  use  is  hardly  older  than  Plato. 


90         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

with  them  than  the  most  honored  and  experienced 
citizen,  who  could  talk  to  them  only  about  their  coun- 
try's history  and  their  social  duties  in  simple,  serious, 
unadorned  speech.  He  not  only  professed  to  teach 
everything,  from  household  economy  up  to  statesman- 
ship and  virtue  itself,  but  he  declared  himself  ready, 
for  a  consideration,  to  show  how  the  individual  might 
successfully  assert  himself  on  all  occasions,  not  only  as 
against  his  fellows,  but  also  as  against  the  state  and  its 
laws.  Such  brilliant  professions  did  not  fall  upon  deaf 
ears.  Young  men  placed  themselves  under  his  tuition, 
and  paid  him  large  sums,  to  learn  the  art  of  successful 
self-assertion. 

When  we  consider  the  necessary  effect  of  such 
teaching  upon  the  social  fabric,  we  can  easily  under- 
stand why  the  Sophists  and  their  tendencies  were  held 
in  abhorrence  by  all  conservative  and  patriotic  persons. 
Nevertheless,  it  would  be  unjust  to  conclude  from  this 
;  that  they  were  evil  and  insincere  men,  seeking  to  bring 
about  social  confusion  and  to  profit  by  it.  They  may 
not  have  been,  individually,  models  of  virtue ;  but  cer- 
tainly they  were  not  mere  clever  scoundrels.  They 
/were  the  pioneers  of  a  new  and  higher  social  order, 
/  whose  nature  they  did  not  comprehend,  and  for  which, 
therefore,  they  worked  blindly  and  negatively.  But 
they  did  not  work  the  less  effectively  on  that  account. 
They  called  the  validity  of  the  old  order  in  question, 
loosened  its  bonds,  and  prepared  it  for  yielding  to  a 
new.  The  old  order  had  merged  the  man  in  the  citi- 
zen and  made  public  sentiment  the  ethical  sanction ; 
the  Sophists  were,  in  their  crude  way,  endeavoring  to 
secure  a  foothold  for  the  man  outside  of  the  citizen 
and  to  place  the  moral  sanction  within  his  own  breast. 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  91 

Nor  must  we  allow  ourselves  to  be  blinded  to  the  true 
nature  of  their  enterprise  by  the  very  obvious  mischief 
which  it  worked  at  its  first  inception.  It  put  an  end  | 
(let  us  hope  forever)  to  institutional  ethics,  and  broke  | 
up  the  order  in  which  they  were  embodied;  but  it 
paved  the  way  for  a  higher  sort  of  ethics  and  a  nobler, 
because  freer,  social  system.  Indeed,  it  might  fairly 
be  said  that  all  that  is  best  in  modern  civilization  is 
contained  in  germ  in  the  teaching  of  the  despised 
Sophists.  Their  fundamental  maxim,  "  Man  is  the 
measure  of  all  things,"  may  be  made  to  express  the 
inmost  essence  of  human  freedom. 

The  Sophists  might  be  despised  or  combated  ; 
they  could  not  be  disregarded.  Their  views  contained 
an  element  of  truth  which  affected  even  those  who 
were  most  opposed  to  them,  and  which  was  never  lost. 
From  their  time  on,  two  mutually  hostile  tendencies 
contend  for  supremacy  in  Greek  education  and  life : 
(1)  the  old  religious,  institutional  tendency,  which 
finds  in  the  state  the  aim  an^  sanction  of  all  indi- 
vidual actions ;  and  (2)  the  new,  philosophical,  indi- 
vidualistic tendency,  which  makes  the  most  desirable 
condition  of  the  individual  the  sum  of  all  good  that 
can  be  striven  for.  Henceforth  an  unwearied  struggle 
goes  on  between  the  two  ideals  Worth  (apexTj)  and" 
Happiness  (evSat/i,ovia),  between  objective  good  and' 
subjective  good,  and  defies  the  deftest  efforts  at  recon- 
ciliation. To  trace  the  course  of  this  struggle  will  be 
the  chief  object  of  the  remaining  chapters. 

If  we  wish  to  see  how  the  new  tendency  looked  to 
those  whose  affections  and  convictions  were  bound  up 
with  the  old  order  of  things,  we  must  go  to  the  pages 
of  Aristophanes.     Here,  of  course,  we  must  not  look 


92         EDUCATION  OP  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

for  fairness ;  nevertheless,  if  we  discriminatingly  tone 
down  the  pictures  of  the  hostile  caricaturist,  we  shall, 
undoubtedly,  arrive  at  something  very  near  the  truth. 
\  Aristophanes  depicts  for  us  the  new  tendency  chiefly 
in  four  spheres  of  manifestation :  (1)  education,  (2) 
private  morality,  (3)  public  morality,  (4)  religion,  and 
'in  each  tries  to  bring  out,  in  all  its  implications,  and  to 
hold  up  to  ridicule  and  scorn  the  gospel  of  individual- 
ism.    We  shall  consider  these  in  order. 

1.  In  education  he  finds  that  the  old  endeavor  after 
manliness,  simplicity,  and  modesty  has  given  way  to  an 
effeminate  indulgence  which  expresses  itself  in  luxury 
and  irreverence.  Boys,  instead  of  going  to  school,  as 
in  the  good  old  days,  in  marching  order,  with  down- 
cast looks,  and  with  the  meagrest  of  clothing,  now  find 
their  way  to  it  singly,  staring  impudently  at  every  one 
they  meet  and  making  a  show  with  the  heavy  clothing 
in  which  their  pampered  limbs  are  wrapped,  and  which 
makes  free  activity  impossible.  Arrived  at  the  music- 
school,  instead  of  striking  up  some  of  the  old,  heroic 
national  songs,  and  singing  with  a  gusto  their  simple 
Doric  airs  that  stirred  the  blood  and  warmed  the  heart, 
they  tune  their  feeble  voices  in  Lydian  measures  to 
some  languishing,  sentimental  love-ditty,  which  makes 
them  conscious  of  themselves  and  their  slumbering 
passions,  or  in  plaintive  Phrygian  elegiacs  to  some  epi- 
grammatic, moral  gnome,  which  provokes  reflection  and 
morbid  self-introspection.  Passing  to  the  palaBstra,  they 
are  more  eager  to  display  the  charms  of  their  smooth 
and  delicate  bodies  than  to  harden  them  by  vigorous 
exercise,  more  careful  to  leave  an  imprefesion  of  them 
in  the  sand,  to  suggest  lewdness,  than  an  impression 
of  the  sand  upon  them.     When   they  return   home, 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  93 

they  are  bold,  irreverent,  and  disobedient.  They  sit 
with  their  legs  crossed,  snatch  the  daintiest  morsels 
from  the  table,  gorge  themselves  with  luxuries,  talk 
back  to  their  parents,  call  their  fathers  by  the  most 
disrespectful  names,  and  treat  them  as  insufferable, 
old-fashioned  bores.  When  they  grow  older  and  are 
allowed  to  go  out  alone,  instead  of  attending  the  gym- 
nasia and  taking  part  in  their  manly  exercises  with 
others  of  their  own  age,  they  lounge  about  the  streets, 
squares,  and  bath-houses,  cracking  lewd  or  silly  jokes, 
or  taking  part  in  captious  and  sophistical  disputes 
upon  matters  that  have  no  practical  value,  perhaps 
even  flirting  with  the  demi-monde.  As  a  result  of  all 
this,  they  are  narrow-chested,  sallow-complexioned, 
round-shouldered,  and — long-tongued.  Worse  still, 
they  are  utterly  corrupt  morally,  being  addicted  to 
viG€Ss  of  which  it  is  not  permitted  even  to  sp^ak. 
Sireh  is  the  sad  picture  which  Aristophanes  draws  of 
the  results  of  individualism  on  education. 

2.  Nor  is  the  picture  of  its  effects  upon  private  life 
more  attractive.  Here  he  finds  selfishness,  greed,  and 
dishonesty  pervading  every  relation.  Wives  are  luxuri- 
ous, shrewish,  snobbish,  and  unfaithful ;  children  are 
cunning,  self-indulgent,  and  impure ;  slaves  are  lazy, 
wasteful,  lying,  and  debauched ;  husbands,  fathers,  and 
masters  neglect  their  duty  to  their  families  and  inher- 
ited property,  and  devote  themselves  to  the  acquisition 
of  wealth  by  low  and  often  dishonest  means.  Whereas 
in  the  old  time  families  had  lived  simply  and  healthily 
on  the  produce  of  their  farms,  the  possession  of  which 
gave  them  their  title  to  citizenship,  they  are  now  vying 
with  each  other  in  luxury  and  display,  the  means  to 
which  have  to  be  derived  from  usury  or  business-profits, 


9J:         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

both  alike  accounted  ignoble  afid  unworthy  of  free 
men.     Honor  has  given  way  te-^ealth. 

3.  The  effects  of   indi^iSnaUsni  upon  public  life 
are  summed  up  for  Aristophanes  in  the  one  word  de- 
mocracy.    Democracy  is  the  horror  of  horrors,  and  he 
devotes  much  of  his  most  brilliant  and  humorous  writ- 
^  ing  to  an  arraignment  of  it.     He  endeavors  to  show 
that,  whereas  in  the  old  days  all  political  power  was  in 
the  hands  of  the  wisest  and  worthiest  men,  who  used 
it  for  the  public  welfare,  now  it  is  in  those  of  the 
basest   and   most  ignorant,  who  employ  it   for  their 
\  own  ends.     Instead  of  the  individual's  being  the  de- 
I  voted  servant  of  the  state,  as  formerly,  the  state  is 
/  now  the  servant  of  the  individual ;  politics  is  a  money- 
V  making  business.     In  the  sausage-vender  (aAAavroTrw- 
\y]i)  of  the  Knights  he  has  given  us  a  picture,  exag- 
gerated indeed,  but  vivid  and,  in  its  main  implications, 
true,  of  the  popular  politician  of  his  time,  with  all  his 
ignorance,  stupidity,  vulgarity,  greed,  and  bestiality; 
and  in  the  same  work  he  has  given  us  another  picture, 
not  less  true  to  life,  of  the  selfish,  testy,  waspish,  pam- 
pered, gullible  Athenian  people,  ever   ready  to   put 
their  faith  in   any  adventurer,  however  vulgar,  who 
promises  to  make  life  easy  and  comfortable  for  them, 
to  give  them  plenty  of  anchovies  and  cushioned  seats. 
\        4.  But  nowhere,  according  to  Aristophanes,  has  in- 
'  dividualism  wrought  greater  evil  than  in  the  sphere  of 
^  religion.     Here  it  appears  as  philosophy  or  reflective 
thought,  and  lays  the  axe  at  the  very  root  of  the  social 
tree  ;  for  religion,  as  we  hav^e  seen,  is  that  root.     Aris- 
tophanes was  entirely  right  in  thinking  that  the  substi- 
tution of  scientific  or  philosophic  notions  for  the  old 
gods  must  necessarily  be  fatal  to  the  institutions  based 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OP  PHILOSOPHY.  95 

upon  the  latter.  And  he  finds  that  they  are  substi- 
tuted. Jupiter,  Athena,  and  Apollo  have  been  con- 
signed by  the  Sophists  to  the  limbo  of  fable,  and  in 
their  room  have  been  placed  Clouds,  Vortex,  and — Gab 
(yAoio-o-a) !  Evcn  men  who  are  not  directly  influenced 
by  philosophic  ideas  have  lost  faith  in  the  gods,  and 
are  either  atheists  or  sunk  in  gross  superstition.  In 
the  opening  of  the  Kniglits^  Nicias,  being  asked  on 
what  ground  he  believes  in  gods,  replies :  "  Because  I 
am  an  enemy  to  gods."  And  further  on  we  are  shown 
what  foolish  and  debasing  confidence  is  placed  in  ficti- 
tious oracles  coming  from  gods  and  shrines  which  no 
one  ever  before  heard  of,  and  which  in  many  cases  did 
not  exist. 

Thus  in  every  department  of  social  life  Aristophanes 
finds  a  process  of  dissolution  going  on  which  he  fore- 
sees must  in  the  end  be  fatal  to  the  conditions  of 
moral  and  political  life.  Accordingly  he  uses  all  the 
resources  of  his  inimitable  humor  to  cast  ridicule  and 
discredit  upon  those  whom  he  conceives  to  be  the  chief 
authors  of  the  mischief — the  Sophists.  Aristophanes 
was  so  far  right :  the  tendency  represented  by  the 
Sophists  did  paralyze  and  ruin  the  Greek  polities  ;  but 
he  was  not  far-sighted  enough  to  discover  that  out  of 
that  ruin  would  arise  a  nobler  polity — one  not  neces- 
sarily confined  to  small  communities,  but  capable  of 
infinite  extension,  because  based  on  what  is  purely 
essential  in  man.  The  limitations  of  his  view  could 
not  have  been  shown  more  strikingly  than  by  his 
choice  of  Socrates  as  the  representative  of  the  Soph 
ists.  As  the  reasons  for  this  have  rarely  been  under- 
stood, and  Aristophanes  has  been  blamed  for  gross 
injustice  to  the  great  martyr,  it  will  be  well  to  stop 
8 


96         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

for  a  moment  and  consider  just   how  far   Socrates 
might  with  justice  be  taken  to  represent  the  sophistic 
tendency.     Such  consideration  will  help  us  to  under- 
>s^  stand  the  suhsequent  course  of  Greek  education. 
0>v^    We  have  seen  that  the  rise  of  philosophy  meant  the 
'     advent  of  individual  and  reflective  thought,  as  distin- 
guished from  the  social  and  unreflective  thought  of 
previous  ages.     We  have  seen,  further,  that  the  Soph- 
ists had  formulated  the  fundamental  principle  of  this 
thought  in  the  maxim,  "Man  is  the  measure  of  all 

]  things,"  and  that  in  consequence  they  had  striven  to 
remove  the  criteria  of  truth  and  the  grounds  of  action 

.  from  external  traditions  and  the  institutions  embody- 

*  ing  them,  and  to  place  them  within  the  breast  of  each 
individual  human  being.  It  is  obvious  that  such  an 
undertaking  logically  compelled  them  to  call  in  ques- 

'  tion  the  reality  of  all  institutional  beliefs  and  sanctions, 
including  the  gods  and  all  the  mythology  relating  to 
them,  and  that  this  would  necessarily  lead  to  the  dis- 
solution of  institutions — to  what  the  Greeks  called 
anarchy  (dvapxta,  absence  of  authority).  Kow  the 
question  is.  In  how  far  did  Socrates  agree  with  all 
this? 

In  the  dialogues  of  Plato  and  elsewhere  Socrates 
figures  so  largely  as  the  irreconcilable  foe  of  the  Soph- 
ists as  to  have  led  to  the  belief  that  he  had  nothing  in 
common  with  them,  and  that  he  utterly  abhorred  their 
principles  and  tendencies.  Yet  this  is  very  far  indeed 
from  the  truth.  In  every  one  of  the  above  positions 
maintained  by  the  Sophists  Socrates  was  at  one  with 
them.  No  one  believed  more  firmly  than  he  that  the 
ultimate  test  of  truth  and  sanction  of  right  lies  within 
the  breast  of  each  individual ;  and  no  man  was  ever 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  97 

V  more  contemptuous  of  political,  social,  or  even  what 
\0  claimed  to  be  divine, authority,  if  it  did  not  carry  with 
it  the  voice  of  his  inner  being.  Indeed,  it  was  to  main- 
tain this  position  that  he  lived  and  died.  /'  The  differ- 
ence between  the  Sophists  and  Socrates  lay  not  at  all 
in  principles,  but  in  the  interpretation  of  them.  When 
they  said,  "  Man  is  the  measure  of  all  things,"  they  in- 
terpreted "  man  "  as  the  individual  man,  and  then  there 
followed  for  religion  and  society  all  the  consequences 
for  which  history  has  held  them  responsible.  Socrates, 
seeing  that  absurd  moral  consequences  could  not  fol- 
low from  a  true  principle  correctly  interpreted,  and 
not  being  able  to  fight  the  Sophists'  principle,  turned 
his  arms  against  their  interpretation  of  it,  maintaining 
that  the  "  man "  who  is  the  measure  of  all  things  is 
not  at  all  the  individual  man  who  eats,  drinks,  and 
sleeps,  but  the  transcendent  and  universal  man.  What 
astonishing  results  for  thought  and  action  were  the  re- 
sults of  this  contention  we  shall  see  in  the  next  chapter. 
At  present  it  is  enough  to  say  that  these  results,  widely 
different  as  they  were  from  those  reached  by  the  Soph- 
ists, were  no  less  incompatible  than  those  with  the  re- 
ligious principles  upon  which  Greek  polity  rested,  how- 
ever conducive  they  might  be  to  a  polity  of  a  higher 
order.  As  far,  then,  as  Aristophanes  or  any  conserva- 
tive Greek  was  concerned,  there  was  no  difference  be- 
tween Socrates  and  the  Sophists ;  the  principles  of 
both  were  equally  fatal  to  the  old  Greek  social  and 
moral  order.  Add  to  this  the  fact  that  the  term 
"  Sophist "  in  Aristophanes's  time  had  none  of  that 
special  and  unpleasant  connotation  which  it  afterward 
acquired,  and  that  in  reality  Socrates  was  as  much  a 
Sophist  as  Protagoras;  add  also  the  other  fact  that. 


98         EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

while  all  the  other  Sophists  were  foreigners,  and  there- 
fore comparatively  uninteresting,  if  not  unfamiliar,  to 
the  body  of  the  Athenian  people,  and  we  can  have  no 
difficulty  in  acquitting  the  great  satirist  of  any  unfair- 
ness to  the  yet  greater  martyr  in  making  him  the  repre- 
sentative of  the  disorganizing  tendency  of  rationalism. 

It  may  be  supposed  from  what  has  been  said  thus 
far  that  the  first  person  to  oppose  this  influence  was 
Socrates,  and  if  we  confine  our  attention  to  Athens 
this  is  true  ;  but  just  as  the  effects  of  philosophy  were 
felt  in  Ionia  and  Magna  Graecia,  where  it  had  its  ori- 
gin, before  they  were  felt  in  Greece  proper,  so  the  ef- 
forts to  counteract  them  were  first  made  in  those  re- 
gions. Among  the  men  who  put  forth  such  efforts, 
the  most  prominent  and  successful  was  Pythagoras,  of 
whose  attempt  to  incorporate  philosophy  with  social 
life  we  must  now  take  account. 

Pythagoras,  a  native  of  Samos,  was  born  fully  a 
century  before  Socrates.  It  seems  that  he  made  his 
first  effort  to  establish  a  society  on  a  philosophic 
basis  in  his  native  island,  but,  being  unsuccessful 
among  its  lonians,  he  emigrated  to  Magna  Graecia, 
hoping,  perhaps,  to  find  more  favorable  circumstances 
and  a  more  tractable  people,  among  the  Achaeans  and 
Dorians  of  that  region.  Nor  was  he  mistaken.  Set- 
tling in  Croton,  and  discarding  the  name  "  sophist," 
as  too  ambitious,  for  the  more  modest  one  of  "  phi- 
losopher," he  gathered  round  him  a  carefully  selected 
knot  of  young  men,  and  sought  to  form  them  into  a 
society  by  strict  discipline  and  instruction.  His  aim 
was  to  counteract  the  disorganizing  effects  of  individ- 
ualistic reflection,  not  by  any  change  in  the  laws  or 
government  of  the  state,  but  by  the  formation  of  a 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.  99 

new  organization  based  upon  new  principles,  oatside 
of  it.  He  seems  to  have  regarded  as  useless  any  at- 
tempt to  put  new  wine  into  old  skins,  and  to  have  felt 
that  the  new  thought  demanded  a  new  polity.  In  con- 
sidering how  such  a  polity  might  be  called  into  exist- 
ence, he  saw  that  the  first  step  was  to  subject  men  to 
a  new  system  of  education  involving  new  principles  of 
social  union.  Such  a  system  he  then  thought  out  and 
applied.  It  contained  three  distinct  though  insepara- 
ble elements — (1)  a  theory,  (2)  a  discipline,  (3)  a  sanc- 
tion. Though  the  origin  of  the  first  is  involved  in 
obscurity,  its  gist  is  not  difficult  to  state.  The  central 
conception  of  all  Pythagoras'  thinking  is  that  of  Har- 
mony. To  him  the  whole  system  of  the  universe  is  a 
harmony,  capable  of  being  expressed  in  terms  of  num- 
ber.* As  a  consequence,  all  evil,  whether  in  the  indi- 
vidual or  in  society,  is  nothing  but  disharmony,  and 
will  disappear  when  that  is  removed.  To  remove  it, 
and  to  make  man  and  society  follow  the  same  divine 
laws  that  work  so  unerringly  in  the  starry  heavens  and 
in  the  whole  of  Nature,  is  the  aim  of  all  Pythagoras'  ef- 
forts.! But  inasmuch  as  harmony  implies  the  exist- 
ence of  higher  and  lower  tones  standing  in  a  certain 
definite  relation  to  each  other,  Pythagoras,  in  regard- 

*  Pythagoras  is  said  to  have  been  the  first  person  who  used 
"  cosmos  "  {kSc/ios  =  order)  to  designate  the  world,  and  I  strongly 
suspect  that  the  use  of  pvdixiCeiv  (to  rhythmicize)  in  the  sense  of 
"  to  train  "  is  likewise  due  to  him.  It  is  employed  in  this  sense^-" 
by  ^schylus  and  Plato,  both  of  whom  show  so  many  other 
marks  of  Pythagoras'  influence. 

t  It  is  difficult  not  to  believe  that  the  sublime  contrast  be- 
tween the  order  of  Nature  and  the  disorder  in  man,  drawn  by 
the  Watchman  in  the  prologue  of  ^schylus's  Agamemnon,  was 
suggested  by  the  teaching  of  Pythagoras. 


100      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK   PEOPLE. 

ing  man  and  society  as  harmonies,  necessarily  endowed 
them  with  a  series  of  powers  forming  an  ordered  hi- 
erarchy. In  the  case  of  the  individual,  highest  in  the 
scale  came  reason,  situated  in  the  head  ;  next,  life  and 
sensation,  located  in  the  heart;  next,  the  nutritive 
powers,  claiming  the  abdomen;  and  last,  the  repro- 
ductive powers.  How  the  members  of  the  social  hi- 
erarchy were  named  we  do  not  know ;  but  there  can 
hardly  be  any  doubt  that  they  corresponded  to  those 
composing  the  individual  hierarchy.  Pythagoras'  ef- 
forts at  moral  and  social  reform  naturally  shaped  them- 
selves into  an  endeavor  to  give  full  validity  to  this  hi- 
erarchy, so  that  each  higher  faculty  should  govern  all 
below  it.  Asking  himself  how  this  was  to  be  achieved, 
he  answered  :  "  By  discipline,  through  strict  obedience 
to  one  in  whom  this  hierarchy  has  been  realized,"  as 
he  believed  it  had  in  himself.  He  accordingly  under- 
took, by  a  system  of  strict  rules  having  at  first  no  other 
authority  than  his  own  dictum,  to  harmonize  his  pupils, 
and  out  of  pupils,  in  the  various  stages  of  this  process, 
to  form  a  harmonious  social  order.  In  the  individual 
the  reproductive  powers  were  to  be  held  in  subordina- 
tion to  the  nutritive  by  gymnastics,  including  careful 
dieting  ;  the  nutritive,  to  the  sensuous  by  music ;  and 
the  sensuous,  to  the  rational  by  mathematics,  which 
with  Pythagoras  occupied  the  whole  sphere  of  meta- 
physics. Gymnastics,  music,  mathematics,  these  were 
the  three  grades  of  his  educational  curriculum.  By 
the  first  the  pupil  was  strengthened ;  by  the  second, 
purified ;  by  the  third,  perfected  and  made  ready  for 
the  society  of  the  gods.*     There  need  be  little  doubt 

*  All  this  comes  out  in  the  clearest  way  in  the  famous  Golden 
Words  (of  wliich  see  a  translation  in  my  Aristotle,  pp.  57  sqq.). 


AFTER  THE  RISE  OF  PHILOSOPHY.         101 

that  his  pupils  were  divided  into  four  grades,  corre- 
sponding to  the  four  elements  (rerpaKrvs)  of  the  soul- 
harmony,  each  higher  exercising  authority,  direct  or 
indirect,  over  all  below  it,  and  that  this  was  his  type 
of  the  perfect  social  order.  The  supreme  authority  he 
hold  in  his  own  hands  while  he  lived,  and  avros  c</>a 
(He  said  so)  decided  all  questions  without  appeal. 
But  although  this  was  true,  Pythagoras  never  pre- 
tended that  his  own  will  furnished  the  only  sanction 
for  what  he  did  and  commanded.  On  the  contrary, 
he  claimed  to  have  derived  it  from  the  gods,  whose 
will  he  conceived  to  be  the  harmony  of  the  world. 
*•  Worth  and  health  and  all  good  and  God  are  a  har- 
mony," he  said.  We  need  not  wonder,  therefore,  that 
he  laid  great  stress  upon  the  worship  of  the  gods  and 
heroes,  with  due  regard  to  their  rank,  and  that  he 
gave  much  attention  to  divination,  which  he  tried  to 
cultivate  as  a  science. 

Such,  in  brief  outline,  is  the  educational  system  of 
Pythagoras^a  system  which  aims  atlaniversal  harmony, 
to  be  realized  through  discipline,  guided  by  the  sanc- 
tion of  divine  revelation.  How  powerful  and  endur- 
ing its  effect  upon  later  theories  was,  we  shall  see  in 
subsequent  chapters.  Here  it  is  enough  to  see  that  it 
is  the  prototype  of  all  those  systems  which  assume  hu- 
man well-being  to  depend  upon  a  social  order  in  which 
every  individual  has  his  appointed  place,  just  as  the 
system  of  the  Sophists  is  the  prototype  of  those  which 
hold  that  the  social  order  must  have  its  origin  in  the 
wills  of  the  individuals  composing  it  and  be  the  re- 
sultant of  them.  The  former  found  its  highest  ex- 
Why  Zeller  should  call  this  work  "colorless  and  desultory" 
(PMlos.  der  Oriechen,  vol.  i,  p.  250)  I  can  not  understand. 


102       EDUCATION  OF  T0E  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

pression  in  the  Church  and  Empire  of  the  Middle 
Age ;  the  latter  is  seeking  to  make  itself  valid  in  the 
democracies  of  the  modern  world.* 

*  The  Church  was  the  organ  of  ascetic  or  individual  disci- 
pline ;  the  state,  of  social  discipline ;  and  in  true  Pythagorean 
fashion,  the  former  claimed  precedence  over  the  latter,  as  being 
the  medium  of  divine  inspiration.  It  is  supremely  interesting 
to  see  that  our  modern  Pythagoreans,  the  Socialists,  do  not  sus- 
pect that  their  fancied  Utopias  are  utterly  incompatible  with 
democracy. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE  EFFORT  TO   FIND   11^   IN^DIYIDUALISM  A   BASIS 
OF  SOCIAL  ORDEE. 

Up  to  the  date  of  the  struggle  with  Persia,  Sparta 
had  been  the  leading  power  in  Greece.  This  was  due, 
in  great  measure,  to  the  fact  that  in  her,  better  than 
elsewhere,  was  realized  the  ideal  of  the  -city-state. 
Through  the  rigorous  discipline  of  her  public  s}stem 
of  education,  which  began  at  birth  and  ended  at  death, 
she  forced  her  citizens  to  devote  themselves,  body  and 
soul,  solely  to  her  interests  and  the  maintenance  of  her 
strength.  It  mattered  nothing  to  her  that  this  was 
achieved  only  through  the  renunciation  of  all  higher 
culture.  Her  ambition  was  to  be  strong,  and  she  was 
so.  In  this  she  resembled  republican  Rome,  whose' 
strength  was  in  great  measure  due  to  the  sedulous  ex-'j 
elusion  of  philosophy,  art,  and  literature.  And  there 
can  hardly  be  any  doubt  that  if  the  city-state  had  con- 
tinued to  be  the  supreme  object  of  individual  interest, 
Sparta  would  have  remained  at  the  head  of  Greece. 
Her  ideal  for  the  individual  w^as  worth,  and  she  strove 
after  it  with  all  her  might.  But  in  another  portion 
of  Greece  a  new  ideal  had  arisen  alongside  the  old, 
namely,  ruSat/Aovia,  or  individual  happiness.  This, 
though  in  many  respects  inferior  to  the  other,  had. 


104      EDUCATION  OP  TJIE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

like  all  ideals  when  they  are  new,  called  out  in  its  fol- 
lowers a  very  large  amount  of  enthusiastic  activity.  It 
had  inspired  the  Athenians  with  new  life ;  and  since  it 
had  not  yet  weakened  their  old  social  bonds,  it  made 
them  capable  of  ^deeds  at  which  the  world  still  stands 
in  amazement.  >  It  seems  to  be  a  fact  that  the  greatest 
achievements  in  the  world's  history  have  always  been 
performed  by  peoples  who  were  under  the  inspiration 
of  a  new  ideal,  but  had  not'  lost  the  social  solidarity 
due  to  that  which  preceded  it — a  fact  which  enables  us 
to  understand  why  brilliant  periods  are  of  such  short 
duration.  Certainly  this  was  the  case  with  Atheas^4*^ 
So  it  came  to  pass  that,  when  the  Persian  wars  were 
over,  she  found  herself,  as  thejicknowledged-savior  of 
Greece,  in  the  position  which  Sparta  had  previously 
occupiecl.  And  she  was  very  proud  to  occupy  it,  feel- 
ir,g,  as  she  did,  that  her  powers  were  adequate  to  any 
task.  She  was  not  aware  that  that  exquisite  balance 
between  the  old  and  new  ideals,  which  had  made  pos- 
bible  her  victories  in  the  field  and  on  the  sea,  could 
not  long  be  maintained,  and  that  the  new  ideal,  with 
its  disorganizing  influence,  would  inevitably  soon  gain 
the  upper  hand.  But  such  was  the  case.  Ko  sooner 
was  the  enthusiasm  of  victory  over,  and  the  people 
were  beginning  to  settle  down  to  the  ordinary  duties 
of  social  and  political  life,  than  the  effects  of  individu- 
alism an3.  eudaemuulBiiiM  bugan  to  show  themselves  in 
that  corruption  of^trtl'Tt^partments  of  life  Ayhich,  as  we 
saw  in  last  chapter,  called  forth  the'^born  and  reproba- 
tion of  Aristophanes.  And  Aristophanes  was  not  the 
only  serious  patriot  whose  anxieties  were  aroused  by 
this  corruption,  or  who  did  his  best  to  put  an  end  to  it. 
Different  persons  proposed  different  remedies.    Arfs- 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A   SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    105 

tophanes  thought  to  find  one  in  a  return  to  the  old 
order  of  things,  such  as  had  existed  before  the  invasion 
of  reflective  thought.  iEschyhis  would  probably  have 
recommended  the  introduction  of  Pythagorean  ideas 
and  discipline.  Pericles  tried  the  effect  of  diverting 
the  people's  attention  from  private  social  and  political 
complications  by  the  erection  of  great  public  works, 
and  subsequently  by  scheming  to  form  a  Greek  empire 
with  Athens  as  its  head.  But  probably  not  one  of 
these  men  saw  the  true  source  of  the  corruption  and 
weakness  which  they  all  lamented  and  for  which  they 
were  seeking  to  prescribe.  This  insight  was  reserved  ^ 
for  Socrates,  who,  though  he  was  not  enabled  thereby 
to  save  his  country  from  ruin,  was  permitted  to  dis- 
cover the  principle  by  which  a  social  order  of  a  far  * 
higher  type  and  more  inclusive  reach  was  rendered^ 
possible  for  the  whole  world.  Thanks,  in  great  meas- 
ure, to  him,  when  Greece  fell,  free  humanity  rose  on  her 
ruins.  When  she  melted  away,  her  life  passed  into  the 
life  of  mankind  and  became  its  light.  Our  next  task, 
then,  is  to  consider  the  origin  and  nature  of  the  So- 
cratic  principle,  and  then  to  trace  its  effects  upon 
Greek  education. 

In  the  second  half  of  the  fifth  century  b.  c,  when 

Socrates  was  pursuing   his  vocation,  there  were  two 

opposite  tendencies  at  work  in  the  Hellenic  world, 

both  of  them  equally  hostile  to  the  existing  polities. 

One,  the  tendency  toward  undisciplined  individualism, 

found  expression  in  the  teaching  of  the  Sophists ;  the 

other,  the  tendency  toward  disciplined  socialism,  in 

^that  of  Pythagoras.     The  former  was  plainly  paralyz- 

^jing  and  breaking  up  the  social  organism ;  the  latter 

^lad  provoked  the  most  violent  opposition  and  persecu- 


106      EDUCATION  OF  T^E  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

tioii  in  the  regions  where  it  had  started,  and  where,  if 
anywhere,  it  might  have  expected  to  succeed.  The 
Pythagorean  communities  in  Magna  Graecia  had  been 
broken  up  with  fire  and  sword  and  their  surviving 
members  scattered  throughout  the  Hellenic  world.  To 
Socrates,  who  with  earnest  eye  was  watching  the  move- 
ments of  his  time,  it  one  day  became  evident  that 
neither  of  these  tendencies,  left  to  itself,  could  lead  to 
anything  but  ruin.  He  concluded  that  they  must  both 
be  wrong  in  principle ;  and  then  there  was  forced  upon 
him  the  question,  What  must  be  the  principle  of  a 
movement  that  will  result  in  social  regeneration? 
Thenceforward  the  search  for  this  principle  was  his 
life-task.  He  began  it  by  submitting  to  careful  scrutiny 
the  principles  of  the  two  tendencies  then  at  work,  and 
as  that  of  the  Sophists  was  affecting  his  immediate  sur- 
roundings far  more  than  the  other,  he  directed  his  first 
and  chief  attention  to  it.  "  Man  is  the  measure  of  all 
things,"  Protagoras  had  said.  "  Yes,"  mused  Socrates, 
"  that  is  clearly  so ;  for  whatever  other  measure  he  may 
apply,  must  in  the  last  resort  be  approved — that  is, 
measured — by  him.  But  then,  what  is  man  ?  Who  am. 
I?"  Socrates  was  probably  the  first  person  in  the 
world  that  ever  addressed  that  question  to  himself,  and 
the  more  he  thought  of  it,  the  more  he  was  puzzled  and 
staggered  by  it.  He  remembered  that  the  Delphic  ora- 
cle had  commanded  Kxow  thyself  (yvwOi  o-eauTov), 
and  he  plainly  did  not  know  himself.  He  concluded 
that,  if  he  did  not  know  himself,  he  did  not  know  any- 
thing, and  accordingly  made  this  confession  openly. 
What  he  meant  was  that  of  the  knowledge  needed  to 
solve  the  problem  before  him  he  had  not  any;  tha* 
what  people  usually  called  knowledge,  that  of  whic] 


\ 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A  SOCli^L  PRINCIPLE.    109 

the  individual  man  was  the  measure,  was  i^  social  order 
at  all,  but  mere  opinion  (Sd^a).     He  now  sa\.does  not 
that  all  the  evils  of  individualism  came  from  tiiL^te  to 
tempt  to  make  this  opinion  the  guide  and  norm  6t 
action,  and  that,  before  any  other  guide  could  be  found, 
some  new  kind  of  truth,  different  from  opinion,  and 
not  depending,  like  taste  and  smell,  upon  individual 
idiosyncrasies,  must  be  discovered.     This  opened  up 
the  whole  question  of  the  nature  of  truth  and  of  the 
human  mind  as  its  organ.     UpJ^-^^^  time  the  attea-f  . 
tion  of  wise  men  had  been  dn-ected  jto  the  externaj  / 
worldTag'-'vvfaaf ~conceptio^^^  they  hadjbeen  able_ to 
form_of^it  they  had  naively  adopted  as  true  witlKrut 
scrutiny  anxTj^hEouFTnquiring  wl^ 
corJ*^ctl^ounei_In  this  wa^  arrived  at  opinion,^ 

nqt_truth.     Socrates  now  turned Jiisj|tention  inward",    V 
^nd  began_to  ask.  What  are  the  conditions  for  the 
formation  of  true  cbnceptions7~~a^rid7"^W^at~must  be 
the  nature  of  the  being  that  possesses  these    condi- 
tions ?  or,  again.  Who  am  I  ? 

These  are  the  two  most  fundamental  questions  that 
the  human  being  can  ask,  and  philosophy  has  no  other 
task  than  to  answer  them.  It  is  needless  to  say  that 
Socrates  did  not  succeed  in  answering  them.  At  the 
same  time  he  took  the  first  important  steps  in  that 
direction.  He  began  by  making  clear  to  himself  (1) 
that  truth,  to  deserve  the  name,  must  be  true  for  every- 
body and  not  depend  upon  individual  peculiarities; 
(2)  that  this  is  possible  only  if  all  intelligences,  as 
such,  are  in  some  way  one  intelligence,  or  have  a  neces- 
sary common  content.  He  saw  that,  if  he  could  estab- 
lish the  truth  of  these  postulates,  he  might  fairly 
conclude  that  the  measure  of  all  things  is  not  the 


/ 


106      EDUCATION  rz^^  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

tion  in  the  tp^  such,  but  the  individual  in  so  far  as  he 
anywherp-  the  common  intelligence,  which  is  the  true 
Pyth'-ct  of  all  truth.*  As  the  question  was  one  which, 
h-fom  its  very  nature,  could  not  be  decided  by  the  indi- 
vidual intelligence,  he  went  about  the  world  examining 
his  fellow  men  to  see  whether  they  had  a  common  in- 
telligence, and,  if  so,  to  discover  what  the  content  of 
that  intelligence  was.  "  That  content,"  he  said,  "  will  i 
be  truth  and  the  true  social  bond."  In  pursuing  this  / 
examination,  which  he  did  through  conversation,  he/ 
developed  his  famous  method,  subsequently  called  the/ 
dialectic,  that  is,  conversational,  method.  This  con/ 
sisted  in  taking  any  conception  as  it  lay  in  the  indit 
vidual  mind  and,  by  a  process  of  induction,  showing  its 
limitations  and  self-contradictoriness ;  then,  by  remov-A 
ing  these  limitations  and  bringing  the  conception  out 
wdth  all  its  relations  and  implications,  proving  that  it 
was  the  same  for  all  intelligences.  The  conclusion 
which  he  himself  drew,  and  which  he  wished  his  inter- 
locutors and  hearers  to  draw,  was  that  men  think  dif- 
ferently only  because  they  think  imperfectly,  super- 
ficially, one-sidedly,  and  do  not  see  the  full  meaning 
of  their  own  thoughts.  Complete  thoughts  are  the 
same  for  everybody.  Having  satisfied  himself  upon 
this  point,  he  next  endeavored  to  make  a  list  of  suQh 
complete  thoughts  as  bore  more  directly  upon  moral 
life — courage,  temperance,  worth,  friepd^hip,  etc. — 
and  to  show  their  interconnection,  so  that,  presenting 
themselves  as  an  ordered  system  of  universal  truth, 

*  It  is  easy  to  see  how  such  a  conclusion  as  this  opened  the 
way  for  the  pantheism  of  the  Neoplatonists,  the  "  one  intelli- 
gence "  of  the  Arabs,  and  the  panlogism  of  Hegel. 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A  SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    109 

they  might  be  made  the  basis  of  a  new  social  order 
and  the  material  of  a  new  education.  It  does  not 
seem  that  he  ever  advanced  so  far  as  to  formulate  to 
himself  all  that  is  implied  in  the  existence  of  uni- 
versal truth ;  but  he  did  see  that,  in  order  to  be  the 
subject  of  it,  man  must  contain  something  more  than 
his  individuality,  something  more  than  Protagoras  had 
found  in  him,  and  that  without  it  no  public  morality 
and  no  social  order  were  possible.  He  drew  only  the 
ethical  conclusions,  leaving  the  ontological  for  others 
to  draw.  Moreover,  it  does  not  seem  that  he  was  ever 
able  to  put  his  conclusions  into  a  practical  form,  or  to 
suggest  any  method  by  which  they  might  be  em- 
bodied in  actual  social  life ;  but  he  certainly  would 
have  deprecated  the  disciplined  socialism  of  Pythago- 
ras as  much  as  the  unbridled  anarchism  of  the  Soph- 
ists. If  the  latter  left  men  a  congeries  of  atoms,  held 
together  by  no  force  at  all,  the  former  bound  them 
into  an  iron  system  by  an  external  force,  depriving 
them  of  that  autonomy  which  is  the  very  condition  of 
moral  life,  and  which  it  was  Socrates'  special  mission 
to  bring  to  light  and  to  champion. 

The  dialectic  method  played  a  great  part  in  all  sub-r>^ 
sequent  education,  philosophy,  and  religion,  nay,  eveni/^ 
in  politics,  and  its  effects  were  partly  good  and  partly 
evih/As^a  means  of  refuting  the  sophistic  position, 
aw  demonstrating  the  presence  of  a  universal  element 
in  human  reason,  it  was  invaluable.     If  it  did  not  en- 
able Socrates  to  find  out  what  he  was,  it  showed  him  at 
least  what  he  was  not — viz.,  a  creature  of  sense  with  only 
a  subjective  consciousness,  as   Protagoras   had   held. 
Again,  as  a  means  of  revealing  the  laws  of  thought    ■ 
and  exposing  the  fallacies  of  sophistic  reasoning,  it  did 


^ 


110      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

admirable  service,  paving  the  way  for  the  science  of 
logic.  But  when  it  was  assumed  to  take  the  place*  of 
experience  and  to  reveal  the  content  of  thought  as 
well  as  its  form  or  laws,  when  it  was  supposed  to 
enable  men  to  ascend  to  a  vision  of  the  eternal  pow- 
ers or  realities  of  which  the  phenomenal  world  offers 
but  a  faint  and  passing  reflection,  then  it  did  infinite 
harm.  It  led  those  who  incautiously  employed  it,  not 
only  to  distinguish  subjective  sense  from  objective  in- 
telligence, which  was  well,  but  to  separate  the  two  and 
regard  them  as  belonging  to  two  different  worlds — one 
wholly  evil  and  the  other  wholly  good,  one  from  which, 
and  the  other  to  which,  it  was  man's  duty  to  escape. 
This  unjustified  separation,  with  its  evil  results  to 
education,  philosophy,  and  religion,  has  haunted  the 
world  from  Socrates'  day  to  our  own.  In  education 
it  has  encouraged  asceticism  and  withdrawal  from  the 
world ;  in  philosophy,  intellectualism  and  formal  ide- 
alism ;  in  religion,  inactive  contemplation  and  dread 
of  the  senses.  In  all  departments  it  has  led  man  to 
mutilate  his  nature,  and  to  strive  to  throw  away  one 
part  as  worthless,  instead  of  doing  his  best  to  sanctify 
it  as  a  whole. 

These  different  effects  of  the  dialectic  method  were 
not  slow  in  manifesting  themselves  even  in  the  life- 
time of  Socrates.  Through  his  plain  but  attractive 
personality,  his  keen  intellect,  his  quaint  humor,  his 
genial  irony,  his  imperturbable  temper,  his  modesty, 
his  professed  ignorance,  his  earnestness,  his  easy  victo- 
ries over  his  opponents  in  dispute,  and  his  affection 
for  young  men,  he  soon  became  far  more  popular  than 
the  best  of  the  foreign  Sophists,  with  their  vanity, 
pretension,  and  impatience  of  contradiction.     While 


INDIVIDUALISM  A3  A  SOCIAL  PEINCIPLE.    m 

they  might  leave  their  hearers  full  of  admiration  for 
their  brilliant  speeches  and  specious  arguments,  he  left 
them  ashamed  of  themselves  and  with  a  desire  to  be 
better  than  they  were.  While  they  appealed  to  their 
selfish  instincts,  he  woke  in  them  a  higher  conscious- 
ness. While  they  flattered  them,  he  educated  them*— ^ 
But  if  Socrates  found  it  necessary  to  oppose  the  teach- 
ing of  the  Sophists,  which  was  breaking  down  the  social 
and  political  organization  about  him,  he  could  not  rec- 
ommend the  naive  popular  conceptions  which  were  the 
life  of  that  organization.  He  saw  that  it  was  just  be- 
cause these  conceptions  were  feeble  and  superannuated 
that  they  yield€;d  so  easily  to  the  attacks  of  the  Sophists. 
Thus,  while  he  was  willing  to  die  rather  than  transgress 
the  laws  of  the  state,  he  could  not  give  his  countenance 
to  the  popular  notions  on  which  the  state  rested.  Thus 
it  came  to  pass  that,  while  the  whole  tendency  of  his 
teaching  was  constructive,  and  not  destructive,  like 
that  of  the  Sophists,  it  was  hardly  less  fatal  than  • 
theirs  to  the  existing  institutions.  Theirs  discredited 
the  sanctions  which  gave  these  institutions  their  au- 
thority without  offering  substitutes ;  he  offered  sub-  . 
stitutes.  Aristophanes'  picture  of  Socrates  misrepre- 
sents the  matter,  not  the  tendency,  of  his  teaching.  If. 
this  did  save  many  of  the  young  men  of  Athens  from 
the  disorganizing  poison  of  the  Sophists,  it  at  the  same 
time  turned  them  away  from  the  external,  imaginary 
deities  of  their  country,  and  encouraged  them  to  look 
for  another  deity  in  the  depths  of  their  own  conscious- 
ness. And  however  far,  in  a  spirit  of  conciliation  or 
compromise,  he  might  try  to  interpret  the  new  sanc- 
tions in  terms  of  the  old  (as  many  men  did  before  and 
have  done  since),  he  could  not  transfer  the  constrain- 
9 


112      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

ing  power  of  the  former  to  the  latter.  He  might  call 
the  moral  lawgiver  lodged  in  his  own  bosom  Zeus  or 
Athena,  but  he  could  not  make  any  one  identify  that 
Zeus  with  the  marble  statue  that  stood  in  the  Olympi- 
eum,  or  that  Athena  with  the  chryselephantine  colossus 
that  occupied  the  Parthenon.  And  the  mere  fact  that 
he  encouraged  his  hearers  to  look  into  themselves  and 
study  their  own  minds  made  his  influence  one  which 
turned  them  away  from  prompt  and  spontaneous  po-  , 
litical  activity,  and  gave  them  a  bent  toward  quiet  con- ' 
templation,  which  soon  came  to  be  placed  at  the  head 
of  the  occupations  suitable  for  Staywyi}.  Thus  it  was 
that  Socrates  became,  as  the  capital  charge  against 
him  set  forth,  an  introducer  of  new  gods  and  a  cor- 
rupter of  youth. 

If  we  ask  ourselves  what  is  the  difference  between 
the  education  which  existed  before  the  rise  of  reflective 
thought  and  that  which  Socrates  would  have  recom- 
mended, the  answer  is  that,  while  the  former  was  essen- 
tially a  preparation  for  a  state  and  an  or^er  of  things 
already  existing,  the  latter  was  a  preparation  for  a  . 
commonwealth  that  had  not  yet  appeared ;  the  former 
had  a  real,  the  latter  an  ideal  aim ;  the  former  was 
conservative,  the  latter  revolutionary  and  progressive. 
It  is  easy  to  see  that,  if  the  principles  of  Socrates  had 
been  allowed  to  prevail  in  education,  they  would  have 
speedily  abolished  those  limitations,  domestic,  phra- 
trial,  and  political,  which  made  the  Greek  common- 
wealth possible. 

That  the  teaching  of  Socrates  soon  affected  the 
practice  not  only  of  the  gymnasia,  but  also  of  the 
palaistras  and  schools,  is  rendered  evident  by  a  passage 
in  the  Lysis  of  Plato.    Here  Socrates  is  made  to  relate    • 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A  SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    113 

how,  as  he  was  one  day  walking  by  the  road  immedi- 
ately outside  the  city- wall,  from  the  Academy  to  the 
Lyceum,*  he  was  invited  by  a  knot  of  young  men 
(veavto-Kot)  to  enter  an  inclosure  the  door  of  which 
stood  open.  They  inform  him  that  they  and  many 
other  beautiful  (koAoi)  youths  spend  their  time  there. 
On  asking  what  sort  of  a  club  {BLaTpL/3rj)  it  is,  he  is  told 
that  it  is  a  palaestra,  recently  built ;  but  that  most  of 
their  time  is  spent  in  discussions  under  the  direction 
of  a  certain  Miccus,  "  a  companion  and  admirer  "  of 
his.  "  Sure  enough,"  says  Socrates,  "  a  decent  fellow 
and  a  capable  '  sophist ' !  "  It  would  seem  as  if  the 
"  palaestra ''  had  been  built  expressly  as  a  school  for  the 
dissemination  of  Socrates'  teaching,  and  that  it  was 
well  attended.  And  one  effect  of  this  teaching  was  that 
physical  training  was  neglected,  and  the  chief  atten- 
tion given  to  lectures  and  discussions  (Xoyot),  the  very 
thing  of  which  Aristophanes  complains  so  bitterly. 
That  this  change  in  educational  practice  resulted  in 
a  loss  of  public  spirit  and  a  tendency  to  effeminate 
self-indulgence  is  obvious  enough  from  what  is  related 
in  the  dialogue  itself.  Nor  is  this  to  be  wondered  at 
when  we  consider  the  character  of  the  older  Greek 
education.  And  here  some  important  reflections  sug- 
gest themselves. 

The  old  education  had  depended  for  its  effect 
upon  training  and  habit,  and  only  to  a  very  small 
degree  upon  moral  choice.  Its  purpose  was  to  pro- 
duce men  who  should  worthily  subserve  an  end  which 

*  These  were  evidently  his  favorite  resorts.  They  offered  the 
best  opportunities  for  meeting  young  men  beyond  school-age. 
It  will  be  remembered  that  later  on  Plato  established  his  school 
in  the  former,  and  Aristotle  his  in  the  latter. 


114:      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

they  neither  set  up  nor  chose — viz.,  the  stability  and 
well-being  of  the  state.  To  encourage  reflection  and 
self-initiated  action  would  have  been  to  defeat  this 
purpose.  It  need  cause  no  surprise,  therefore,  that, 
when  reflection  was  actually  awakened,  and  could  not 
again  be  put  to  sleep,  but  persistently  obtruded  its 
rational  sanctions,  youths,  no  less  than  men,  who  had 
never  been  accustomed  to  look  to  it  for  the  motives 
of  their  actions,  should  have  been  perplexed,  paralyzed, 
and  demoralized.  To  this  serious  risk  is  always  ex- 
posed any  system  of  education  which  tries  to  substi- 
tute habit  and  training  for  reflection  as  the  guides 
of  action.  It  should  always  be  borne  in  mind  that 
habitual  action,  however  serviceable  to  institutions, 
and  however  necessary  as  a  preparation  for  moral 
action,  is  not  moral  action  itself.  That  can  be  initi- 
ated only  by  reflection,  deliberation,  and  free  choice 
between  understood  motives.  Strange  as  it  may  seem, 
the  attempt  to  make  persons  who  have  always  been 
guided  by  habit  act  from  motives  of  reflection  is  almost 
certain  to  result  in  temporary,  if  not  permanent,  de- 
moralization of  action.  That  Socrates  saw  this  and  did 
his  best  to  prevent  it  among  his  countrymen  is  clear 
enough ;  but  though  he  was  more  than  a  match  for 
the  Sophists,  he  had  no  arguments  strong  enough  to 
meet  the  logic  of  the  moral  law. 

Sir  Henry  Sumner  Maine,  in  speaking  of  the  Hel- 
lenic origin  of  progress,  says :  "  Except  th-e  blind  forces 
of  Nature,  nothing  moves  in  this  world  which  is  not 
Greek  in  its  origin."*  If  we  consider  all  forms  of 
action  not  due  to  reflection  and  choice  as  springing 

*  Village  Communities  and  Miscellanies,  p.  238,  Amer.  edit 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A  SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    115 

from  "  blind  forces,"  this  is  strictly  true ;  but  then  we 
must  say  that  the  life  of  the  Greeks,  as  well  as  of  other 
peoples,  before  the  rise  of  reflective  thought,  was  guided 
by  these  forces.  The  Greece  that  originated  progress 
began  with  Socrates,  in  whom  reflective  thought,  for 
the  first  time  in  history,  became  conscious  of  its  own 
implications.  It  was  in  his  time,  and  owing  to  him, 
that  men  first  began  to  lead  a  moral  life,  that  they 
passed  from  the  dominion  of  the  laws  of  nature,  use, 
and  wont,  and  became  subject  to  those  of  free  spiritual 
reflection.  Thfi^iaoiaentousness  of  this  transition  Jor 
all  departments  of  human  life^^ly  the^hole  subse-  / 
quent  course  of  history  can  reveal.  *^ 

When  Socrates  had  arrived  at  the  conclusion  that 
the  future  moral  sanction  and  social  bond  must  be 
sought  in  universal  intelligence,  there  still  lay  before 
him  the  problem  of  how  that  bond  was  to  be  intro- 
duced, and  made  to  ingroove  itself  with  that  which 
was  then  in  force.     It  does  not  appear  that  he  ever 
attained  to  clearness  in  this  matter ;  but  it  is  probable 
that  he  thought  the  new  bond  might  be  gradually  sub- 
stituted for  the  old  without  any  great  wrench  or  dis- 
turbance to  the  existing  order.    He  had  builded  better  I 
than  he  knew.    He_dii.Bjlt_Sfie*  and  very  few  men  have  / 
ever  seen,  that  a  social  bond  having  its  origin  in  uni-j 
versal  intelligence  must  include  every  being  that  par-[^ 
ticipates  in  that  intelligence.    Nevertheless,  his  teach- 
ing brought   a   dim   consciousness   of   this  into   the 
Hellenic  world,  and  from  that  time  on,  this  worked 
like  a  leaven,  transforming  ethnic  into  cosmopolitan 
life.     Its  influence  upon  education  was  exactly  what 
might  have  been  expected.     Whereas  previously  the  /  _ 
purpose  of  all  instruction  had  been  to  produce  dutiful 


116      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

citizens,  it  henceforth  more  and  more  aimed  at  pro- 
ducing self -poised  men,  thinking  for  themselves  and 
choosing  their  own  mode  oljife.  More  and  more 
those  who  were  subjected  to  it  withdrew  from  polit- 
ical and  practical  life,  and  devoted  themselves  to  philo- 
sophic meditation  or  contemplation,  trying  to  realize 
in  thought  and  imagination  a  commonwealth  which 
should  be  at  once  a  school  of  virtue  and  an  Elysium 
of  happiness. 

If  the  teaching  of  Socrates  worked  disorganizingly 
in  most  departments  of  Greek  life — in  education,  poli- 
tics, and  religion — there  was  one  department  in  Avhich, 
as  might  have  been  expected,  it  had  a  most  beneficial 
and  elevating  effect.  This  was  art.  It  is  a  remarkable 
fact  that  the  palmy  period  of  Greek  art — the  period 
which  produced  Phidias  andlPol3Tfttlis,  Scopas  and 
Praxiteles — coincides  exactly  with  mat  filled  by  the 
activity  of  Socrates,  Plato,  and  Aristotle.  Before  this 
time  Greek  art  had  been  practiced  altogether  in  the 
service  of  the  state,  and  had  sought  merely  to  body 
forth  those  conceptions  which  it  represented  and  ap- 
proved. Its  favorite  subjects  were,  of  course,  gods, 
heroes,  warriors,  and  victors  in  gymnastic  contests; 
and  in  these  it  was  the  element  of  worth,  and  not 
that  of  beauty,  that  was  held  to  give  them  importance 
and  a  claim  to  admiration.  We  have  only  to  look  at 
the  pre-Phidian  statues  in  the  museums  of  modem 
Greece  to  convince  ourselves  of  the  truth  of  this. 
They  are,  for  the  most  part,  not  lacking  in  strength 
and  impressiveness ;  but  they  are  rude,  stiff,  expres- 
sionless, and  not  seldom  grotesque.     They  are  simply 

1  the  old  religious  and  patriotic  melodies  done  in  stone. 

^  But  from  about  the  time  when  Socrates'  activity  as  a 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A  SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    117 

public  teacher  begins,  a  most  remarkable  change  comes 
over  the  whole  spirit  of  Greek  art.*  Not  only  does  the 
range  of  subjects  widen,  but  the  figures  begin  to  ex- 
press character.  They  are  no  longer  dead  symbols, 
but  living  persons,  instinct  with'  purpose  and  resolu- 
tion. In  a  word,  they  begin  to  express  ideas,  to  give 
form  and  substance  to  that  invisible  world  which  is 
soon  to  become  the  aim  of  all  philosophic  thinking 
and,  after  a  time,  of  life  itself.  But  the  invisible 
world  is  conceived  as  a  world  of  rationality,  order, 
beauty,  Staywyrj,  and  hence  the  products  of  art  begin 
to  reflect  these  qualities.  Thus  art  ceases  to  minister 
to  practical  life  and  becomes  master  of  ceremonies  to 
diagogic  life.  It  no  longer  seeks  to  edify,  but  to 
satisfy ;  no  longer  to  rouse  to  action,  but  to  invite  to 
contemplation.  And  since  this  is  the  true  function 
of  art,  it  was  no  fault  of  Socrates'  if  the  influence 
which  his  thought  exerted  upon  it  made  it  one  of  the 
agents  which  helped  to  dissolve  the  life  of  the  Greeks 
into  that  of  the  great  world.  All  other  art — the  art  of 
Egypt,  Assyria,  Persia,  the  art  of  Rome  and  Etruria 
even^ — has  become  a  mere  element  in  the  history  of 
the  past ;  but  Greek  art  is  universal,  eternal  art,  as , 
fresh  and  beautiful  to-day,  as  capable  of  satisfying  the/ 
demands  of  diagogic  life  as  it  was  four  centuries  be- 1 
fore  our  era.  Being  the  expression  of  eternal  reason 
and  truth,  it  is  as  enduring  as  they  are. 

*  It  should  not  be  forgotten  that  Socrates  himself  was  origi- 
nally, as  his  father  had  been,  a  sculptor.  Among  his  works 
were  a  Hermes  and  a  group  of  draped  Graces  {Tlfiddi,  'AyXata, 
&d\€ia),  which  long  stood  at  the  entrance  to  the  Athenian 
Acropolis,  and  must,  therefore,  have  been  of  considerable 
merit. 


118       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

When  Columbus  set  sail  across  the  untraversed 
western  sea  his  purpose  was  to  reach  by  a  new  p  .th 
a  portion  of  the  old,  known  world,  and  he  lived  \nd 
died  in  the  belief  that  he  had  done  so.  He  n^iver 
knew  that  he  had  discovered  a  new  world.  So  it  was 
with  Socrates.  When  he  launched  his  spiritual  bark 
upon  the  pathless  ocean  of  reflective  thought  his  ob- 
ject was  to  discover  a  new  way  to  the  old  world  of 
little  commonwealths  and  narrow  interests,  and  he 
probably  died  thinking  that  he  had  succeeded.  He 
did  not  dream  that  he  had  discovered  a  new  world — 
the  world  of  humanity  and  universal  interests.  But 
so  it  was ;  and  though  mankind  are  still  very  far  from 
having  made  themselves  at  home  in  that  world,  and 
from  having  availed  themselves  of  its  boundless  spir- 
itual treasures,  it  can  never  again  be  withdrawn  from 
their  sight,  nor  the  conquest  of  it  cease  to  be  the  ob- 
ject of  their  highest  aspirations. 

Looking  back  now  over  the  ground  traversed  in 
the  last  chapter  and  in  this,  we  can  see  that  between 
the  period  of  the  old  political  education  and  the  time 
at  which  we  have  arrived  there  have  been  three  dis- 
tinct influences  at  work:    (1)  that  of  the  Sophists, 
almost  wholly  destructive  in   its  immediate   effects; 
(2)  that  of  Pythagoras,  almost  purely  constructive,  but 
employing  external  sanctions  and  a  rigid  ascetic  disci- 
pline, tending  to  socialism  ;  (3)  that  of  Socrates,  op-  f 
posed  to  both  these,  and  endeavoring  to  maintain  the  ' 
old  social  order,  but  upon  a  new  principle  derived  from 
reflective  intelligence.     Each  of  these  influences  left 
its  mark  upon  the  school  education  of  Greece.     It  was^ 
through  the  first  that  rhetoric  and  grammar  were  added 
to  the  school  curriculum ;  musical  science,  mathematics 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A  SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    119 

(aritlimetic  and  geometry),  and  astronomy  *  were  due 
to  the  second ;  dialectics  and  drawing,  to  the  third. 
And  so  it  was  that  at  the  beginning  of  the  fourth 
century  B.  c.  the  old  simple  curriculum  of  the  schools, 
consisting  of  singing,  a  little  lute-playing,  reading  and 
writing,  was  widened  out  into  a  curriculum  which  in- 
cluded every  one  of  what  were  known  in  mediaeval 
times  as  the  Seven  Liberal  Arts,  with  the  addition  of 
one  more — viz.,  drawing.  While  this  expansion  was 
progressing  in  the  music-schools,  a  corresponding  con- 
traction was  going  on  in  the  palaestras.  These  were, 
no  doubt,  still  attended;  but  the  physical  exercises 
seem  to  have  become  less  vigorous  and  systematic,  and 
the  time  allotted  to  them  to  have  been  largely  occupied 
with  intellectual  gymnastics.  Thus,  as  Aristophanes 
complains,  the  boys  came  to  have  narrow  chests  and 
shoulders  and  large  tongues. 

But  great  as  was  the  change  that  came  over  the 
schemes  of  education  in  the  schools  and  palaestras,  it 
was  not  equal  to  that  which  took  place  in  the  educa- 
tion of  young  men  after  they  left  these  institutions, 
and  became,  so  to  speak,  pupils  of  the  state.  Here 
the  state  and  the  philosopher  came  into  actual  com- 
petition. While  the  former  claimed  the  young  men 
for  physical  and  military  training,  with  a  view  to 
practical  life,  the  latter  claimed  them  for  intellectual 
training,  with  a  view  to  diagogic  life.  And  the  phi- 
losopher generally  carried  the  day,  with  the  result  that 

*  It  will  be  remembered  that  in  the  school  of  Socrates,  as 
caricatured  by  Aristophanes,  there  stand  two  -new  Muses^ 
Astronomy  and  Geometry.  This  seems  to  show  that  these 
studies  were  first  introduced  into  the  Athenian  schools  in  the 
time  of  Socrates,  and  perhaps  under  his  influence. 


120      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

the  gymnasia,  though  not  ceasing  to  be  schools  for 
physical  training,  gradually  became  schools  of  philoso- 
phy ;  and  it  is  as  such  that  two  of  them,  the  Academy 
and  the  Lyceum,  have  transmitted  their  names  to 
modern  institutions.  No  doubt  many  young  men 
still  passed  the  examination  for  cadetship  and  went 
through  their  two  or  three  years  of  militia-service; 
but  even  during  that  time  they  were  not  safe  from 
the  approach  of  the  philosopher,  and  when  it  was  over 
and  they  returned  to  the  city  with  all  the  liberties  of 
independent  citizens,  they  were  completely  in  his 
power.  Many  of  them,  accordingly,  instead  of  devot- 
ing themselves  enthusiastically,  as  their  fathers  had 
done,  to  the  practical  business  of  the  state,  and  trying 
to  attain  influence  in  its  councils,  turned  aside  to  the 
more  alluring  paths  of  speculative  thought.  It  is  dif- 
ficult for  us  who  can  look  back  upon  the  long  history 
of  speculation,  with  its  few  brilliant  conquests  and 
many  blasted  hopes  and  pitiful  failures,  to  conceive 
how  it  looked  in  those  early  days,  when  its  unexplored 
heights  seemed  to  be  the  very  god-inhabited  peaks  of 
Olympus,  and  to  be  accessible  by  the  easy,  if  somewhat 
tortuous,  path  of  dialectics. ;  Beside  the  world  of  truth 
and  beauty,  which  seemed  to  loom  up  there,  the  things 
of  the  every-day  world  looked  mean  and  paltry.  Men 
began  to  ask  themselves  why  they  should  toil  and 
struggle,  intrigue,  dispute,  and  go  to  battle  for  the 
sake  of  such  poor  and  transient  goods,  when  in  peace- 
ful contemplation  the  dialectically-trained  soul  could 
rise  to  the  possession  of  all  the  glory  of  immortal 
things.  "  Philosophy,"  they  admitted,  as  Kovalis  did 
long  after,  "  can  bake  no  bread ;  but  she  can  procure 
for  us  God,  Freedom,  and  Immortality,"  and  what  is 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A  SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    121 

bread,  they  asked,  in  comparison  with  these  ?  When 
we  fully  realize  this  condition  of  mind,  induced  by  the 
new  speculative  thought,  we  can  easily  appreciate  the 
force  of  that  amusing  scene  in  Aristophanes's  Clou^-'', 
in  which  Socrates  appears  suspended  in  a  basket  ani^. 
is  made  to  say :  "  I  am  walking  the  air  and  growing 
wise  about  the  sun,"  *  with  much  more  of  the  same 
sort. 

If  we  now  ask  ourselves  what  Socrates  really  accom- 
plished in  the  Greece  of  his  own  time,  and  why  his  in- 
fluence roused  such  opposition  in  conservative  circles 
as  to  lead  to  his  death,  we  shall  have  no  difficulty  in 
finding  the  true  answer.    He  succeeded,  in  large  meas-K" 
ure,  in  counteracting  the  purely  individualistic  influ-  r'^ 
ence  of  the  Sophists,  which  was  leading  to  such  utter 
skepticism,  worldliness,  and  materialism  in  all  the  de-j 
partments  of  life  as  to  threaten  the  very  existence  of 
society;  but  he  substituted  for  that  influence  another" 
which,  while  it  led  in  the  very  opposite  direction,  was 
hardly  less  fatal  to  the  institutions  that  then  existed. 
Both  influences  tended  to  extremes,  and  safety  and  \ 
health,  as  always,  lay  in  the  golden  mean.     Socrates    \ 
had  solved  one  problem,  only  to  propound  two  others    \ 
no  less  difficult.    He  had  shown  that  the  disorganizing     } 
individualistic  tendency  of  sophistic  teaching  was  to  be    ', 
met  by  the  assertion  of  a  principle  of  social  union  to 
be  found  not  in  individual  opinion,  but  in  universal    ^ 
intelligence  ;  but  he  had  not  shown  how  this  principle  • 
was  to  be  introduced,  while,  in  asserting  it  and  showing     j 
its  nature,  he  had  revealed  a  world  which  drew  men's    / 
attention  away  from  the  interests  of  human  society  al-    1 

*  'Aepofiarw  /col  irepKppovw  rhu  TJAtov,  1.  225. 


122      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

together.  Individualism  still  asserted  itself,  no  longer, 
indeed,  in  the  form  of  worldliness,  but  in  that  of  other- 
worldliness.  There  still,  therefore,  remained  the  two 
c  'lestions:  (1)  How  shall  the  new  rational  principle  of 
social  union  be  introduced?  and  (3)  How  shall  the 
ideal  world,  which  rightfully  claims  man's  supreme 
interest,  be  brought  into  harmony  with,  and  made  to' 
contribute  to  the  well-being  of,  the  real  world  of  the 
present  ?  Before  we  pass  to  the  attempted  solution  of 
these  problems  which  we  find  in  the  pages  of  Socrates' 
successors,  we  must  turn  our  attention  to  a  most  im- 
portant result  of  Socrates'  activity  and  method — 
a  result  which  permanently  and  deeply  affected  all 
future  education  and  morality.  I  mean  the  light 
which  was  thrown  upon  the  immortality  of  the  indi- 
vidual soul. 

No  one  acquainted  with  ancient  literatures  before 
the  advent  of  Socrates,  or  at  least  before  the  rise  of 
reflective  thought,  needs  to  be  told  how  extremely 
feeble  in  them  all  is  the  consciousness  and  hope  of 
individual  immortality.  Whether  we  look  at  the 
poems  of  Homer  or  the  pre-exilic  literature  of  the 
Hebrews,  the  same  fact  stares  us  in  the  face.  Qlt  is 
the  immortality  of  the  nation,  and  not  that  of  the 
individual,  that  is  hoped  for  and  striven  after.*  If 
the  individual  exist  at  all  after  he  closes  his  eyes  upon 
this  world,  it  is  only  as  a  shadow,  a  vague,  bloodless 
ghost,  in  the  gloomy  depths  of  Sheol  or  Hades,  f  or  a 

*  See  in  Sir  W.  D.  Geddes's  edition  of  Plato's  Phcedo  an 
interesting  excursus  on  Phases  of  Ancient  Feeling  toward 
Death. 

t  Compare  the  description  of  Sheol,  Job,  x,  21,  22—"  The  land 
of  darkness  and  of  the  shadow  of  death ;  A  land  of  thick  dark- 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A  SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    123 

phantom  lingering  round  the  scenes  of  its  former  life. 
A  recent  writer  says  of  the  souls  in  Sheol  that  they 
*'  still  subsist,  though  they  do  not  live."  *  It  was  only 
as  men  came  to  turn  their  attention  away  from  their 
bodies  and  senses,  which  divide  them,  and  to  direct  it 
upon  their  intellectual  part,  by  which  they  are  united, 
and  which  plainly  neither  comes  into  existence  nor 
goes  out  of  it  with  the  body,  being  one  with  the  eter- 
nal energy  and  order  of  the  world,  that  they  begin  to 
be  aware  of  their  own  immortality.  And  this  is  as  it 
should  be ;  men  could  hardly  discover  their  own  im- 
mortality until  they  became  conscious  of  that  in  them- 
selves which  is  immortal.  And  this,  we  may  fairly  say, 
was  discovered  by  Socrates.  It  is  true  that  he  did  not 
grasp  it  in  all  its  implications,  having  confined  his  at- 
tention chiefly  to  its  moral  aspects,  and  hence  he  never 
arrives  at  a  perfectly  firm  conviction  of  his  own  immor- 
tality. He  feels  that  the  good  man  ought  to  be  im- 
mortal, but  he  does  not  see  how  to  translate  that 
"  ought  to  be  "  into  "  is."  The  various  arguments  for 
immortality  adduced  in  the  Phmdo  do  no  more  than 
establish  a  strong  rational  probability.  But  the  prin- 
ciple which  he  discovered  soon  came,  in  other  and 
better-schooled  minds,  to  exhibit  the  proof  which  he 

ness,  as  darkness  itself ;  A  land  of  the  shadow  of  death,  without 
any  order,  And  where  the  light  is  as  darkness  " — with  that  of 
Hades  in  the  eleventh  book  of  the  Odyssey,  and  with  the  cry  of 
Achilles  in  the  twenty-third  book  of  the  Iliad,  when  the  ghost 
of  Patroclus  eludes  his  embrace,  *'  Oh  strange !  so  there  is  some- 
thing {tis)  in  the  halls  of  Hades,  a  breath  and  a  phantom,  but 
there  is  no  heart  in  it  M  all "  (1.  103,  104). 

*  Dr.  A.  B.  Davidson,  Book  of  Job  (Cambridge  Bible),  p.  183, 
n.  6.  He  adds :  " '  Destruction,'  Heb.  abaddon,  is  a  synonym  for 
Sheol." 


124       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

could  not  find ;  and  from  his  time  on  the  firm  belief 
in  individual  immortality  became,  though  not  uni- 
versal, nevertheless  common  in  the  Greek  philosophic 
schools,  and  general  among  the  great  mass  of  the 
Greek  people.  And  this  belief  added  to  the  disor- 
ganizing force  of  philosophic  thought. 

Indeed,  the  belief  in  personal  immortality,  substi- 
tuted for  the  old  belief  in  the  immortality  of  the  race 
or  the  nation,  gave  a  new  meaning  and  purpose  to  the 
whole  of  life,  and  turned  men's  activities  into  new 
channels.  As  long  as  men  felt  that  their  citizenship 
was  in  this  world  they  made  all  their  plans  for  this 
world,  and  for  it  alone.  "  The  brief  sum  of  life,"  says 
Horace,  "forbids  us  to  begin  long  hope.  Soon  the 
night  will  be  upon  thee,  and  the  ghosts  of  story,  and 
the  cheerless  house  of  Pluto "  ( Odes^  I,  4).  But  no 
sooner  did  they  come  to  think  that  their  citizenship 
(iroXLTevfjia)  was  in  heaven,  as  St.  Paul  says,  than  they 
began  to  lay  their  plans  for  eternity,  and  to  treat  their 
earthly  life  as  a  mere  transient  preparation  for  that. 
"  We  ought  not,"  says  Ai'istotle,  "  to  side  with  those 
who  counsel  us,  as  being  men,  to  confine  our  thoughts 
to  human  things,  and  as  being  mortals,  to  mortal 
things,  but,  as  far  as  may  be,  to  play  the  immortal 
(adavaTL^eiv),  and  to  do  our  best  to  live  according  to 
the  noblest  that  is  in  us."  *  Men  regarded  the  family, 
the  state,  and  all  social  institutions  no  longer  as  ends 
but  as  means,  and  as  valuable  only  as  preparing  the 
way  for  a  higher  life.  More  than  this,  instead  of  con- 
ceiving the  sanctions  of  moral  life  to  be  derived  from 
the  social  bond,  as  men  had  formerly  done,  they  now 

*  Nic.  Eth.,  K  7;  1177b,  31  sqq. 


,       INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A   SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    125 

held  that  that  bond  itself  was  derived  from  a  moral 
sanction,  originating  in  a  higher  order  of  being,  and 
revealing  itself  in  the  individual  intellect.  Hence  the 
moral  solidarity  of  the  individual  was  no  longer  with 
his  fellows  in  family  and  state,  but  with  the  supreme 
intelligence,  whereof  family  and  state  were  only  instru- 
ments. Family  and  state,  it  was  said,  were  made  for 
man,  and  not  man  for  them.  Man  is  not  the  slave, 
but  the  lord,  of  institutions. 

It  is  almost  impossible  to  conceive  a  greater  or 
more  pervasive  change  in  ethical  thought  and  life- 
purpose  than  this.  Had  it  come  suddenly,  it  would 
certainly  have  rent  the  social  institutions  of  Greece 
to  pieces  like  a  thunderbolt.  Fortunately,  it  came 
slowly,  and  dissolved  them  almost  imperceptibly  into 
the  larger  life  which  was  preparing  to  embody  the 
new  moral  sanctions.  In  no  department  of  life. did 
the  change  show  itself  earlier  or  more  fully  than  in 
that  of  the  higher  education  and  its  relation  to  dia- 
gogic  life.  As  long  as  the  proper  occupations  of  that 
life  were  supposed  to  be  those  enumerated  by  Pindar 
— riding,  gymnastics,  draughts,  and  music — it  could 
hardly  claim  a  great  amount  of  serious  consideration, 
however  much  it  might  be  coveted ;  but  when  for 
these  were  substituted  dialectics  and  the  contempla- 
tion of  the  eternal  world  revealed  by  them,  it  assumed 
a  very  different  position  and  claimed  a  larger  share  of 
time  and  attention.  Indeed,  from  this  time  on  dia- 
gogic  life  gradually  encroached  upon  practical  life  and 
took  precedence  of  it ;  and,  as  a  natural  consequence, 
education  for  the  former,  in  the  same  degree,  took 
precedence  of  education  for  the  latter. 

In  following  the  steps  of  this  change,  we  should  be 


126      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

following  the  process  whereby  the  Greek  man  disen- 
tangled himself  from  the  Greek  citizen  and  laid  claim 
to  a  world  in  w^hich  the  citizen  had  no  part.    In  doing 
this  he  set  an  example  for  all  the  world,  and  began  a 
new  era  in  human  history — the  era  of  moral. freedom.  ■ 
I  have  treated  this  change  and  its  causes  w^th'^^some 
detail  and  emphasis,  because  I  think  that  certain  edu- ' 
cational  and  social  phenomena  of  our  own  time  show 
that  its  meaning  has  not  even  now  been  generally  ap- 
prehended with  any  clearness,  that  we  do  not  yet  know  • 
how  to  take  full  advantage  of  the  victory  which  the . 
Greeks  won  for  us.     In  education  we  are  still  trying 
to  obtain  socially  desirable  results  by  means  of  habit, . 
surroundings,  and  institutional  sanctions,  instead  of 
directly  appealing,  through   the   intelligence,  to  the 
moral  nature  and  rousing  in  it  the  consciousness  of 
universality — or  autonomy,  which  is  at  ^bottom   the  , 
same  thing.     In  social  life  we  are  allowing  economic ' 
complications  to  make  us  look  with  a  half-favorable  • 
eye  upon  schemes  which  would,  if  realized,  go  far  to 
identify  again  the  man  with  the  citizen,  and  to  de- 
prive him  of  his  moral  liberty,  through  which  alone 
he  is  man,  for  the  sake  of  physical  comfort,  the  enjoy- 
ment of  which  does  not  differentiate  him  from  the  pig 
— to  use  the  plain  word  of  Socrates.    We  are  not  keep- 
ing with  sufficient  steadiness  before  our  eyes  the  fact, 
revealed  so  clearly  by  the  history  of  Greek  education, 
that  the  possibility  of  continuous  progress  in  civiliza- 
tion depends  upon  our  not  sacrificing  the  freedom  of 
the  individual  to  any  ideal   static   institution  which 
may  promise  a  certain  more   or  less   uniform   modi- 
cum of  well-being  for  all.     We  are  forgetting  that  the 
ultimate  good  of  man  consists  not  in  what  he  has,  but 


INDIVIDUALISM  AS  A  SOCIAL  PRINCIPLE.    127 

in  what  he  is,  and  that  he  can  be  nothing  at  all  except 

fJthrough  the  exercis^f  moral  freedom,  which  may  cele- 

/•brate  some  of  its  noblestVicturieT  through  that  very 

struggle  which  our  present  tendencies  are  trying  to 
)    eliminate  from  life. 


10 


CHAPTER  VI. 


THE   EN"DEAVOR  TO   FOUND   AN   EDUCATIONAL   STATE 
ON   PHILOSOPHICAL  PRINCIPLES,  AND   ITS   RESULTS. 

Socrates  had  sought  to  show  that  the  true  bond 
of  social  life  must  be  looked  for  in  the  content  of  that 
intelligence  by  which,  through  their  very  nature,  men 
are  united.  He  had  broken  completely  with  the  old 
blood-  and  land-bonds,  and,  though  he  retained  the 
worth  bond,  he  gave  it  a  new  significance  by  making  it 
depend  upon  knowledge.  It  remained  to  give  objec- 
tive reality  to  the  new  combining  principle  by  making 
it  the  basis  of  a  new  social  order. 

Though  it  has  perhaps  never  happened  that  a  social 
order  founded  upon  one  principle  could  transform  it- 
self by  the  adoption  of  another  without  passing  through 
a  phase  of  dissolution,  it  is  conceivable  that  some  great 
spirit,  grasping  in  its  chief  implications  the  Socratic 
principle,  might  have  so  wrought  it  into  education  and 
into  the  popular  mind  that  it  should  gradually  have 
united  the  separate  states  of  Greece  into  a  great,  free 
federal  republic,  fitted  to  lead  the  civilization  of  the 
world  for  a  thousand  years.  Had  Socrates  founded  a 
school  and  sent  forth  its  members  as  apostles  with  the 
definite  mission  to  announce  the  advent  of  the  king- 
dom of  liberty,  in  which  each  subject  should  recognize 


THE  PHILOSOPniC  STATE.  129 

the  state  as  the  embodiment  of  his  own  rationality, 
and  therefore  the  condition  of  his  own  freedom,  it 
seems  as  if  such  a  result  might  have  actually  been 
reached.  But  neither  Socrates  himself  nor  any  one  of 
his  immediate  followers  was  able  to  fathom  the  mean- 
ing of  his  principle  sufficiently  for  this. 

How  little  that  principle  was  understood  even  by 
the  most  gifted  of  his  pupils  is  shown  by  the  political 
scheme  worked  out  and  advocated  by  Plato  in  his  two 
great  works,  the  Republic  and  the  Lmos.    It  is  not  my 
purpose  to  offer  a  detailed  analysis  of  either  of  these, ; 
but  to  point  out,  in  a  general  way,  how  the  philosophic  j 
state  shaped  itself   in  his  mind,  what  education  he  i 
deemed   necessary  for  -it,  and  what  practical  results 
followed  from  it. 

In  working  out  his  scheme  Plato  misinterpreted — 
no  doubt,  he  believed  he  improved  upon — the  Socratic 
principle  in  two  ways.     The  assertion  that  the  princi-  " 
pie  of  social  union  is  universal  intelligence  he  first 
translated  into  the  aphorism,  "  The  state  is  the  indi- 
vidual writ  large."     Then,  having  converted  the  state 
into  a  great  individual,  he  degraded  its  human  mem- 
bers into  mere  organs,  or  rather  into  cells  composing 
the  organs  of  it.    From  this  all  the  rest  of  his  political 
theory  follows  naturally.    The  state,  he  says,  is  a  large   ^ 
individual.     Now,  the  conditions  of  individual  well-  j 
being  are  the  health  and  harmony  of  his  faculties  or 
powers.    These  powers  are  three :  (1)  intelligence  (voOs),  \ 
having  its  acropolis  in  the  head ;  (2)  courage  or  spirit 
(^u/;tos),  encamped  in  the  breast;  and  (3)  appetite  {to 
i-mOvfirjTLKov),  lodged  in  the  abdomen.     Each  of  these   ^ 
has  its  proper  function,  which,  when  duly  performed, 
constitutes  its  excellence  or  worth  (apcTrj).    The  worth 


♦ 

130       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

of  intelligence  is  prudence  {<^p6vrj(rt's) ;  that  of  spirit, 
fortitude  {avhpua) ;  and  that  of  appetite,  temperance 
{(Tu>(l>p(xrvvr]).  The  harmony  of  all  these  is  justice  (Slkol- 
ocrvvrj),  which,  as  combining  the  others,  may  be  regarded 
as  the  basis  of  individual  well-being.  These  four  worths 
are  what  have  been  since  Plato's  time  regarded  as  the 
"  four  cardinal  virtues."  They  are  primarily  attributes 
not  of  relations  between  man  and  man,  but  between 
the  faculties  of  the  individual  man.  Eegarding  the 
state  as  a  great  individual,  Plato  now  looks  for  the 
three  human  faculties  in  it,  and  finds  them  in  three 
orders  or  classes  of  persons.  As  the  organ  of  intelli- 
gence he  finds  the  new  philosophic  class ;  as  that  of 
spirit,  the  military  class ;  and  as  that  of  appetite,  the  in- 
dustrial class.  When  each  of  these  performs  its  func- 
tion healthily  and  in  harmony  with  the  other  two, 
there  result  political  justice  and  social  well-being.  In 
this  system  the  whole  of  the  directing  and  organizing 
power  is  in  the  hands  of  the  philosophers.  The  sol- 
diers are  merely  their  agents,  while  the  workers  or 
wealth-producers  are  the  slaves  of  both. 

AVith  respect  to  this  ideal  polity  there  are  five 
points  that  deserve  attention  :  (1)  it  is  founded  upon 
a  crude  metaphor ;  (2)  we  are  nowhere  told  how  it  is 
to  be  evolved  out  of  existing  conditions;  (3)  it  is 
founded  upon  truths  accessible  to  only  a  small  and 
exceptionally  gifted  portion  of  mankind  ;  (4)  it  takes 
no  account  of  human  affection  or  individual  weal, 
and  therefore  deals  with  only  an  abstract  fragment 
of  man ;  consequently,  (5)  instead  of  being  a  means 
to  freedom,  it  is  an  organ  of  the  most  complete  des- 
potism that  can  be  imagined.  Let  us  consider  these 
points  in  turn. 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  131 

1.  'P]ain'R_R^uhJin  is  foimdftd  n|iori_a^^de  meta- 
phor.  It  is  only  the  loosest  kind  of  thinking  that 
speaks  of  the  state  as  an  individual  or  an  organism. 
That  Plato  should  have  been  entrapped  by  such  a 
metaphor  need  not  surprise  us,  however,  when  we  re- 
member that  the  very  same  metaphor  still  plays  a 
great  and  baneful  part  in  much  of  our  political  and 
economic  thinking.  We  still  hear  a  great  deal  about 
the  "  social  organl^n,"  the  "  social  body,"  the  "  body 
politic " ;  and  on  t\ese  and  similar  metaphors,  taken 
literally,  many  imposing  and  influential  theories,  that 
pass  for  science,  are  built  up.  But  Plato's  political 
system  is  not  the  only  one  that  is  founded  upon  a 
metaphor.  Many  influences  and  movements  of  even 
a  far  wider  reach  have  no  other  or  nobler  origin. 
The  whole  ancient  and  mediaeval  theory  of  cogni- 
tion, which  influences  much  of  our  thinking  even  to- 
day, is  based  upon  a  material  metaphor  which  makes 
knowledge  arise  from  the  complete  fusion  of  the 
knowing  and  the  known.  To  know  a  thing  is  to  be 
it — TO  yap  afiro  vo€lv  ia-riv  re  koI  ihaL,  as  Parmenides 
said,  in  a  similar  way  nearly  all  our  modern  philoso- 
phy, with  all  its  Humean  and  Kantian  skepticisms, 
all  its  Hegelian  subjectless  processes,  and  all  its  Com- 
tean  and  Spencerian  phenomenalism,  has  its  origin  in 
Locke' s  metaphor,  which  makes  knowledge  consist  of 
impressions  similar  to  those  made  by  a  seal  upon  wax. 
And  in  the  department  of  theology  there  is  much  of 
the  same  sort. 

2.  We  are  nowhere  told  how  the  new  polity  is  to 
be  evolved  out  of  existing  circumstances.  The  Re- 
public is  a  work  of  art,  and  has  all  the  character- 
istics of  such.     It  presents  a  sculpturesque  group  in 


132      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

a  static  condition.  It  reveals  neither  past  growth  nor 
future  progress.  Like  all  Utopian  schemes,  it  fails  to 
take  any  account  of  that  very  evolution  which  is  the 
life  of  society.  It  has  nothing  to  say  about  the  ma- 
terial out  of  which,  or  the  method  by  which,  the  new 
order  is  to  develop  itself,  nothing  about  any  principle 
or  goal  of  progress  whereby  its  life  is  to  be  guided. 
It  comes  from  nowhere,  and  it  goes  nowhere.  There 
is  here  a  capital  defect.  To  any  scheme  of  social  re- 
generation which  is  other  than  a  mere  dream  two  con- 
ditions, above  all  others,  are  essential :  (1)  that  it  shall 
take  full  account  of  the  conditions  to  which  it  is  to  be 
applied — the  grade  of  intelligence,  the  desires,  aims, 
and  ideals  of  the  people  whom  it  undertakes  to  ele- 
vate ;  (2)  that  it  shall  make  continuous  struggle  and 
progress  possible  by  exhibiting  an  aim  or  ideal  calcu- 
lated to  enlist  universal  interest  and  energy.  Failing, 
as  it  did,  to  fulfill  either  of  these  conditions,  Plato's 
RepuMic  remained  a  mere  dream,  encouraging  a  tend- 
ency, always  common  enough,  to  separate  theory  from 
practice,  and  to  make  a  fantastic  picture  of  social  per- 
fection do  duty  for  a  sustained  effort  at  social  amelio- 
ration. Thus  it  not  only  contributed  to  alienate  its 
readers  from  the  institutions  about  them,  but  also  to 
encourage  a  fantastic  and  unpractical  spirit  in  them. 

3.  It  is  founded  upon  truths  accessible  to  only  a 
small  and  exceptionally  gifted  portion  of  mankind. 
It  is  in  this  respect  that  it  diverges  most  widely  from 
the  principles  of  Socrates,  and  introduces  notions  to 
which  he  was  apparently  an  entire  stranger.  This  is 
a  crucial  point,  and  one  that,  therefore,  deserves  close 
consideration.  Socrates  had  held  that  all  truth  was 
implicit  in  the  human  mind,  and  required  only  the 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  133 

obstetric  dialectic  (that  is,  conversational)  process  to 
make  it  explicit.  When  explicit,  it  proved  to  be  the 
same  in  all  men,  and  for  this  reason  could  serve  as 
the  principle  of  political  freedom.  In  yielding  sub- 
mission to  the  truth  common  to  all  men,  the  indi- 
vidual was  only  loyal  to  himself,  and  therefore  free. 
And  it  is  perfectly  obvious  that  this  is  the  only 
condition  under  which  political  freedom  is  possible. 
From  this  position  of  Socrates  Plato  entirely — we 
might  almost  say  fatally — departed.  According  to 
him,  truth,  instead  of  being  implicit  in  the  human 
mind,  and  in  every  human  mind,  is  not  in  the  mind 
at  all,  but  lies,  in  the  form  of  self-existent  ideas,  in 
a  region  above  the  heavens,*  to  which  only  a  small 
portion  of  mankind  can  ever  hope  to  have  access, 
since  only  a  small  portion  are  capable  of  climbing 
the  giddy  dialectic  stair  that  leads  thereto. 
3  It  is  not  difficult  to  see  the  momentousness  of  this 
change  of  view.  If  a  _state  is_to  be  based  upon  truth, 
and  truth  lies  where  only  a  few  exceptional  men  can 
reach  it,  it  follows  at  once  (1)  that  no  such  thing 
as  freedom  is  possible  for  men ;  (2)  that  the  organi- 
zation and  management  of  the  state  must  be  left  to 
those  few  men  who  are  able  to  catch  a  glimpse  of 
the  heaven  of  truth.  Plato,  like  the  idealist  he  was, 
shrinks  from  neither  of  these  conclusions.  On  the 
contrary,  he  embodies  both  of  them  in  his  RepnUic, 
in  which  there  is  no  freedom  for  any  one,  but  in 
which  the  philosophers  rule  without  laws  and  without 
responsibility  to  anybody  but  God.  As  Plato's  ideal 
state  was  never  realized,  these  two  conclusions  did  no 
immediate  practical  harm.     But  there  followed  from 

*  Fhcedrus,  247  C. 


134       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

his  view  of  the  nature  and  location  of  truth  others 
that  had  far  more  profound  and  pervasive  conse- 
quences. Since  truth  lies  outside  the  mind,  it  can 
not,  of  course,  be  evolved  by  any  mental  process,  but 
must  come  to  it,  if  at  all,  through  some  sort  of  ex- 
perience, which  the  individual  may  or  may  not  have. 
Those  who  have  it  must,  of  necessity,  possess  a  special 
faculty  for  the  apprehension  of  eternal  and  immutable 
ideas — what  might  be  called  a  supernatural  sense.  To 
this  sense  Plato  gives  the  name  of  love  (cpws)  or  frenzy 
(/xavta),  a  divine  element  in  the  soul,  which  in  its  un- 
developed condition  seizes  upon  the  beautiful  in  its 
most  material  manifestations,  but  which,  in  proportion 
as  it  is  trained,  rises  to  more  and  more  spiritual  forms 
of  beauty,  until  at  last  it  reaches  the  beautiful  itself, 
which  is  one  with  the  good — that  is,  God.*  This  is  the 
faculty  which  sees  divine  things.  Its  action  is  ex- 
pressed by  the  verb  ^cwpctv  and  the  noun  ^cwpta, 
which  Plato  assumed  to  be  derived  from  ra  Oda  6pav, 
and  to  which  accordingly  he  gave  this  meaning. f  In 
a  passage  already  alluded  to  (Phwdrus,  247  C  sqq.) 
we  read :   "  This  supercelestial  region  no  earthly  poet 

*  See  the  closing  sentences  of  Plotinus'  tract  On  the  Beauti- 
ful, Enneads,  I,  6.    Plotinus  fairly  enough  interprets  Plato  here. 

f  Trendelenburg,  Element.  Log,  Arisiot.,  says :  "  Already  in 
Plato  d«ap(iv  is  transferred  from  an  attentive,  passive  looking  at 
divine  things  or  games  to  a  contemplation  of  the  true  with  all 
the  energy  of  the  mind  (alta  mente)."  In  Aristotle,  Metaph.,  A, 
1073b,  23  5^.,  the  above  etymology  is  obviously  assumed,  and 
Simplicius,  commenting  upon  the  passage,  says :  "  Of  all  parts 
of  the  intellect,  the  divinest  is  theory  {Oewpla)."  Compare  Alex- 
ander of  Aphrodisias,  Comment,  on  Analyt.  PH.,  Scholia  to 
Berlin  edition,  p.  141b,  2  sq.;  and  Suidas,  Lexicon,  sub  voc. 
Qtoipia. 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  135 

has  ever  sung,  or  ever  will  sing,  worthily  ;  but  it  is  of 
this  sort.  We  need  surely  have  no  hesitation  about 
telling  the  truth,  especially  since  truth  is  the  very 
thing  we  are  talking  about.  So,  then,  the  colorless, 
formless,  intangible  essence,  which  essentially  is,  which 
is  visible  only  to  the  pilot  intellect,  and  which  is  the 
object  of  all  true  science,  inhabits  this  region.  The 
mind  of  God,  being  fed  with  intellect  and  pure  sci- 
ence, and  beholding  Being  after  a  space,  loves  it,  and, 
contemplating  (Oewpovcra)  the  truth,  is  nourished  and 
made  happy  until  the  revolution  brings  it  back  to  the 
same  point  in  the  circle.  In  this  revolution  it  sees 
justice  itself  (absolute  justice),  it  sees  temperance,  it 
sees  science — science  not  as  it  is  with  the  addition  of 
becoming,  nor  under  the  various  aspects  in  which  it 
occurs  in  what  we  call  being,  but  as  it  is  in  that 
which  is  essentially  being.  .  .  .  And  this  is  the  life  of 
the  gods.  As  to  the  other  souls,  that  which  most  no- 
bly follows  and  resembles  God,  raises  the  head  of  its 
charioteer  into  the  outer  region  and  is  carried  round 
with  the  revolution,  although  disconcerted  by  the 
horses,  and  beholding  with  difficulty  the  things  that 
are;  whereas  that  which  sometimes  rises  above  and 
sometimes  sinks  below,  through  the  intractability  of 
the  horses,  sees  some  things  and  fails  to  see  others. 
And  all  the  rest,  though  they  follow  with  a  hanker- 
ing for  the  upper  region,  are  borne  round  in  an  im- 
potent, waterlogged  condition,  treading  each  other 
down  and  running  against  each  other  in  their  effort 
to  get  ahead  of  each  other." 

It  may  be  said  that  all  this  is  allegory,  mere  meta- 
phor, and,  indeed,  so  it  is  ;  but  it  is  allegory  that  was 
taken  literally  by  Plato's  followers,  and,  as  so  taken, 


136      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

exercised  a  vast  influence  upon  thought.  And  even  to 
Plato  himself  it  is  not  all  allegory.  It  is  his  serious 
belief  that  the  ideas  which  constitute  true  knowledge 
have  their  abode  in  a  supercelestial — that  is,  supernat- 
ural— world,  accessible  to  only  a  few  exceptional  souls 
naturally  endowed  with  a  divine  faculty  of  clear-eyed 
love,  which  they  have  trained  and  developed  through 
the  practice  of  dialectics.  This  combination  of  love 
and  dialectics  is  certainly  curious  enough,  and  is  to  be 
understood  only  if  we  regard  dialectics  as  merely  the 
means  whereby  the  soul  discovers  higher  and  higher 
objects  for  its  love.  The  faculty  which  grasps  and 
appropriates  these  objects  is  not  dialectics,  but  love  or 
frenzy.  "  The  greatest  of  blessings  come  to  us  through 
frenzy,  provided  it  is  given  with  a  divine  giving,"  Soc- 
rates is  made  to  say.* 

It  would  be  impossible  to  insist  too  strongly  upon 
this  point  in  Plato's  system,  since  it  is  fraught  with 
I  the  most  momentous  consequences,  and,  indeed,  is  the 
/  one  which  gives  to  that  system  its  chief  interest  and 
importance.  In  one  word,  Plato,  by  placing  truth  in 
a  supernatural  world,  accessible  only  through  a  facul tj 
of  divine  frenzy,  became  the  founder  of  mysticism, 
which  is  the  very  essence  of  spiritual  religion,  and 
which  as  such  has  played  an  overwhelming  part  in  the 
world's  history. 

Historians  of  philosophy,  in  treating  of  Keopla- 
tonism,  are  often  at  a  loss  to  discover  whence  that  sys- 
tem drew  the  mystic  element  which  is  so  prominent  in 
it,  and  are  usually  inclined  to  credit  it  to  the  religions 
of  the  East.  It  seems  to  me  that  this  is  a  mistake,  for 
two  reasons :  (1)  because  these  religions,  so  far  as  I  can 

*  Plmdrus,  2U  A. 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATR  137 

see,  had  nothing  which  corresponds  to  the  mysticism  of 
Neoplatonism ;  and  (2)  because  that  mysticism  is  to 
be  found  without  difficulty  in  the  writings  of  Plato. 
As  to  the  former  of  these,  while  it  may,  and  perhaps 
must,  be  admitted  that  Neoplatonism  contained  a 
magic,  or  theurgic,  and  mantic  element  derived  from 
Eastern  sources,  and  that  this  came  to  be  connected 
with  the  mystic  element,  still  it  is  clear  enough  that 
the  two  elements  are  different,  and  have  different 
origins.  The  truth  is,  they  stand  related  to  each 
other  as  nature-religion  does  to  spirit-religion,  as  ne- 
cessity to  freedom.  Their  union  has  played  a  great 
part  in  religion  for  the  last  two  thousand  years.  It 
gave  rise  to  just  those  elements  in  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  against  which  Protestantism  was  a  revolt. 
Protestantism  tried  to  separate  mysticism  from  the- 
urgy, and,  while  dropping  the  latter,  to  retain  the 
former.  At  all  events,  it  seems  clear  enough  that  the 
origin  of  spiritual  mysticism,  as  distinct  from  material 
theurgy  and  mantic,  is  to  be  sought  nowhere  but  in 
Plato's  doctrine  of  self-subsistent  ideas,  and  that  Neo- 
platonism was,  in  a  far  higher  degree  than  is  generally 
conceded,  a  genuine  continuation  of  Platonism.  ^  \ 
It  seems,  then,  that  Plato's  great  achievement  con-\ 
sisted  not  in  drawing  up  a  scheme  of  an  ideal  state 
upon  Socratic  principles,  but  in  introducing  into  phi- 


losophy  the  notion  of  a  faculty  of  apprehension  higher 
than  sense,  in  fact  (to  use  a  modern  phrase),  the  fac- 
ulty of  the  supernatural.     The  scheme,  as  such,  never    ^ 
had  any  appreciable  effect  upon  political  institutions,  / 
though  it  hovered  long  as  an  ideal  before  unpracticay   I 
minds  ;  but  the  mystic  principle,  which  lay  at  the  bot-[  ( 
tom  of  it,  proved  a  leaven  which  brought  a  ferment 


138       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

\  into  every  department  of  Greek  life,  and,  above  all, 
I  into  education,  until  at  last  it  found  embodiment  in 
}  an  institution  which  was  not  a  state  at  all,  but  a 
1  church.*  How  far  Plato  was  aware  of  the  difference 
between  his  own  principle  and  that  of  Socrates  we  can 
^  not  tell ;  but  certain  it  is  that  instead  of  carrying  on 
I  the  work  of  Socrates,  he  interrupted  it  and  began  a 
I  work  of  his  own. 

"We  need  not  here  consider  the  various  forms  which 
the   mystic   element  in  Plato's  thought  assumed  in 
later  times — in  Keopythagoreanism,  Neoplatonism,  and 
Christianity.    In  his  own  time  and  the  century  follow- 
;■   ing  it  manifested  itself  in  the  form  of  a  tendency  to 
'    turn  away  from  the  affairs  and  interests_of,yiia,^^pjeIdr^ 
and  to  lQo^^(^i;J\a]^]iin^;^jjI  tne  contemplation  of  things 
eternal.     Jnstead^herefore,  of  inducing  men  to^strhja^ 
after  a  higEerform  of  soci^mi©-(if,  indeed,  that  pro- 
pose3~^yTPlato  ^'as^aTiigher  form),  his  influence  went 
to  withdraw  them  more  and  more  from  social  or,  at 
all  events,  political  life,  and  to  make  them  feel  that  ^ 
their  true  citizenship  was  in  the  invisible  world.     If  a 

*  In  taking  this  view  of  Plato's  achievement,  I  am  happy  to 
find  myself  in  agreement  with  Dr.  Gideon  Spicker,  who  in  his 
recent  work,  Die  Ursachen  des  Ver falls  der  Philosophie,  in  alter 
und  neuer  Zeit,  says  in  regard  to  the  mystic  element  in  Neo- 
platonism :  "  Since  this  mysticism  professes  to  be,  more  than 
anything  else,  a  renewal  of  Plato,  we  are  justified  in  surmising 
that  his  philosophy  contains  an  element  akin  to  this  direction 
of  feeling"  (p.  112).  And  he  goes  on  to  point  out  the  presence 
of  this  element  in  Plato.  This  work  of  Spicker  s  is  especially 
important  as  emphasizing  the  fact  that  the  supernatural  sense, 
first  brought  to  light  by  Plato,  is  essential  to  the  existence  not 
only  of  religion,  but  also  of  philosophy,  which  without  it  always 
degenerates  into  rationalism,  and  thence  into  skepticism. 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  139 

state  could  not  be  founded  upon  mystic  vision,  there 
was  nothing — so  at  least  it  seemed — to  prevent  the 
individual  from  attaining  this  vision  for  himself,  and 
communicating  the  content  of  it  to  his  fellows. 

We  have  seen  that  the  gradual  encroachment  of 
diagogic  life  tended  to  weaken  men's  interest  in  prac- 
tical life.     Plato's  RepuUic  was  an  attempt  to  show 
how  the  two  might  be   reconciled,  and   the  former 
made  to  contribute  to  the  perfection  of  the  latter. 
Diagoge  was  to  be   confined   to  the  few  elect  souls 
capable  of  rising  to  a  contemplation  of  eternal  ideas, 
and  these  were  to  convey  the  content  of  that  vision  to 
the  less  favored  majority  of  mankind  for  its  guidance. 
The  attempt  not  only  failed,  hut  ii;  contributed  to  ap^- 
gravate  the  very  evil — viz^indisidjjalism^srrwhich  it  was  _ 
intended  to  cure.     The  effect  of  all  this  upon  educa- 
tion was  very  m'^ll^ed.      The   education   which   had  I 
aimed  at  making  good  citizens  was  spurned  by  men  | 
who  sought  only  to  be  guided  to  the  vision  of  divine  ! 
things.     Hence  the  old  gymnastics  and  music  fell  into  j 
disrepute,  their  place  being  taken  by  dialectics  and  I 
philosophy,  which   latter  Plato  makes  even  Socrates 
call  "  the  highest  music."  *     Similarly  dialectics  came 
to  be  regarded  as  the  highest  gymnastics. 

4.  Plato's  Republic  takes  no  account  of  human  af- 
fection or  individual  will,  and  therefore  deals  with  only 
an  abstract  fragment  of  man.  This  is  the  common 
fault  of  all  the  authors  of  Utopian  systems  from  Plato 

*  Phmdo,  IV,  61  A.  Compare  Chap.  IX :  "  Those  who  lay  hold 
of  philosophy  properly  and  successfully  run  the  risk  of  being 
misunderstood  by  the  rest  of  the  world,  which  does  not  see  that 
the  sole  object  of  their  study  is  to  die  and  to  be  in  the  state  of 
the  dead  "  {airoOwfjffKeiv  re  Koi  TeOyduai). 


140      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

onward.  They  treat  men  as  if  they  were  fragments  of 
glass  to  be  arranged  into  a  pleasing  mosaic,  embodying 
some  theoretic  idea  coming  from  outside.  In  the  case 
of  the  RepiiUic  it  was  supposed  to  come  directly  from 
God,  and  to  be  communicated  to  philosophers,  who 
were  thus  commissioned  to  construct  and  keep  in 
order  the  social  mosaic  without  any  regard  to  the 
affections  or  will  of  its  component  parts.  Men's  af- 
fections, to  a  large  extent,  are  directed  upon  home 
(which  implies  property),  wife,  and  children,  and  their 
wills  seek  to  select  their  own  environment  and  sphere 
of  activity.  All  these  objects  Plato  would  take  away. 
The  citizen  of  his  Republic  is  to  have  neither  home, 
property,  wife,  nor  child  for  his  affections,  nor  any 
choice  with  regard  to  his  own  surroundings  or  occu- 
pation. It  is,  of  course,  entirely  unfair  to  say  that 
Plato  champions  community  of  property  and  wives. 
In  his  scheme  there  is  no  place  for  either.  When  the 
state  requires  childr.en,  it  breeds  them  as  it  would  cat- 
tle, and  rears  them  with  as  little  regard  to  their  parents 
as  if  they  were  chickens  hatched  from  stolen  eggs. 
When  it  requires  material  means,  it  calls  upon  the 
producers  of  wealth  to  furnish  it ;  they  exist  for  that 
mrpose.  When  children  are  born  according  to  state 
regulations,  they  are  taken  possession  of  by  state  of- 
ficials, and  if  they  seem  vigorous  and  free  from  defect, 
they  are  placed  in  public  institutions  to  be  educated ; 
otherwise  they  are  destroyed.  Tlie  education  to  v/hich 
\ej  are  now  subjected  is  in  its  main  features  the' 
same  as  that  current  in  Greece  in  Plato's  time.  But 
it  is  carried  further ;  its  component  parts  are  differ- 
ently emphasized ;  and,  above  all,  it  has  a  different 
aim,  as  far  at  least  as  the  individual  is  concerned. 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  141 

Whereas  the  current  education  aimed  at  producing 
capable  citizens,  practical,  active,  and  patriotic,  thati 
of  Plato  seeks  to  develop  philosophers,  whose  home' 
and  chief  interest  are  in  the  invisible  world.  Those 
children  who  prove  incapable  of  higher  instruction 
are  soon  relegated  to  the  industrial  class,  whose  ain; 
is  supposed  to  be  having,  not  being.  The  others  con- 
tinue their  curriculum  till  about  the  age  of  thirty, 
when  those  who  show  no  special  aptituie  for  dialectics, 
but  seem  active  and  brave,  are  assigned  to  the  soldier 
class,  the  few  that  give  evidence  of  higher  capabilities 
proceeding  with  their  studies  until,  having  attained 
the  divine  vision,  they  are  admitted  to  the  ruling 
philosophic  class.  In  all  this  individual  affection 
and  will  are  completely  ruled  out. 

5.  Plato's  RepuUic^  instead  of  being  a  means  to 
freedom,  is  an  organ  of  the  most  complete  despotism. 
This  follows  directly  from  what  has  been  said  under 
the  last  two  headings.  Any  form  of  government  which 
is  based  upon  mystical  principles  inaccessible  to  the " 
individual  reason  and  imposed  (octroyes)  from  without, 
and  which  disregards  individual  affections  and  will,  is 
of  necessity  a  despotism,  no  matter  what  title  it  may 
assume,  what  lofty  sanctions  it  may  claim  for  itself. 
This  has  been  clearly  shown  in  the  case  of  religious 
politics  claiming  to  be  based  on  divine  revelation.  For 
all  these  Plato's  Republic  furnished  the  model.* 

«  *  It  is  no  part  of  the  purpose  of  this  work  to  give  an  account 
of  Plato's  system  in  detail,  its  provision  for  the  education  of 
women  and  their  equality  with  men,  the  mode  of  life  pursued 
by  philosophers  and  soldiers,  etc.  For  these  I  must  refer  the 
reader  to  my  work  on  Aristotle  aiid  the  Ancient  Educational 
Ideals. 


14:2       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE.      ,^ 


The  appearance  of  that  work  forms  an  epoch  in 
human  history  and  education.  In  the  latter,  indeed, 
it  did  not  cause  any  sudden  change ;  but  its  influence 
gradually  sapped  the  old  system  and  the  old  ideal,  and 
substituted  others  for  them.  Education  ceased  to  be 
political,  and  became  either  philosophical  or  rhetorical ; 
and  precisely  the  same  thing  was  true  of  art,  which  is 
always  an  expression  of  current  education.  To  see 
this  it  is  only  necessary  to  compare  the  dramas  of 
^schylus,  which  are  political,  with  those  of  Euripides, 
which  are  philosophical  and  rhetorical,  or  the  works 
of  Phidias,  such  as  the  Athena  Parthenos,  with  those 
of  Scopas  and  Praxiteles — e.  g.,  the  Niobe  Group  and 
the  Olympian  Hermes.^  As  political  education  decayed, 
those  persons  who  found  themselves  unfit  for  philoso- 
phy betook  themselves  to  rhetoric,  which  was  the  con- 
tinuation of  sophistic,  bearing  the  same  relation  to 
the  teaching  of  the  Sophists  as  dialectic  did  to  that 
of  Socrates  and  Plato.  The  rhetorical  schools  were 
always  the  rivals  of  the  philosophical,  and  had  an  ex- 
actly opposite  tendency.  Just  as  philosophic  educa- 
tion tended  to  suppress  individualism  and  make  men 
feel  that  they  were  but  parts  of  a  great  whole,  so  rhe- 
torical education,  true  to  its  origin,  tended  to  empha- 
size and  re-enforce  it  by  producing  clever,  versatile, 
self-centered  men  of  the  world,  capable  of  making 
their  way  anywhere  by  address,  subtlety,  and  readi- 
ness. Both  kinds  of  education  were  equally  inimical 
to  the  political  life  of  Greece,  the  one  substituting  for 
the  state,  as  the  center  of  interest,  God ;  the  other,  the 
individual. 

Under  these  circumstances  we  need  not  be  sur- 
prised that  the  Athenian  state  gradually  fell  into  de- 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  143^ 

cay,  and  became  an  easy  prey  to  the  semi-barbarous 
Macedonians,  in  whom  the  Aryan  instinct  of  personal 
loyalty  took  the  place  of  political  feeling.  No  state 
will  ever  be  strong  which  is  not  regarded  by  its  citi- 
zens either  as  the  supreme  object  of  interest  and  effort, 
or  as  necessary  to  the  realization  of  such  object.  And 
whenever  either  religion  or  individualism  becomes  the 
supreme  interest,  the  state  must  fall  into  decay,  unless 
it  can  show  that  it  is  essential  to  the  success  of  the 
tendency  which  is  in  the  ascendant.  It  is  always  safest 
when  it  can  show  that  it  is  indispensable  to  both.* 

With  all  this  we  must  not  forget  that  when  Greece, 
as  a  political  power,  decayed,  the  education  and  the 
history  of  the  Greek  people  were  very  far  from  being 
at  an  end.  Indeed,  there  is  a  sense  in  which  it  may  be 
said  that  their  history  was  only  beginning.  Plato  and 
Aristotle  were  right  when  they  looked  upon  the  small 
Greek  states  as  schools ;  and  the  real  manhood  of  the 
Greeks,  their  active  influence  on  the  great  world,  be- 
gan only  when  they  had  graduated  from  these  and  left 
them  behind.  No  doubt  there  is  something  very  at- 
tractive about  the  Greek  pedagogic  states,  and  they 
graduated  some  incomparable  people,  particularly  in 
the  days  of  Marathon  and  Salamis ;  but,  after  all,  they 
only  furnished  the  necessary  preparation  for  the  work 
which  the  Greeks  were  destined  to  accomplish  in  the 
world,  in  the  spheres  of  art,  science,  philosophy,  and 
religion.  This  work  began  only  when  the  small  peda- 
gogical polities  of  Greece  were  going  to  pieces.     We 

*  It  argued  a  profound  insight  on  the  part  of  Constantino 
that,  when  the  Church  had  become  men's  chief  object  of  inter- 
est, he  sought  to  save  the  empire  by  connecting  the  two,  and 
making  the  latter  seem  essential  to  the  former. 
11 


144      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

all  admire  the  patriotic  eloquence  of  Demosthenes, 
and  are  almost  inclined  to  weep  over  the  conquest 
of  Greece  by  the  semi^arbarous  Macedonians  under 
Philip  and  Alexander ;  but  Demosthenes'  attempt  was 
a  romantic,  Quixotic  enterprise,  an  effort  to  swim 
against  the  stream  of  history;  and  the  conquest  of 
Greece  was  precisely  what  was  needed  in  order  to 
make  the  Greeks  set  about  their  appointed  task  of 
educating  the  world,  instead  of  wasting  their  powers 
in  babblings  and  squabblings  among  themselves. 

It  was  through  the  work  done  by  Socrates  and 
Plato  that  the  Greeks  were  enabled  to  complete  the 
education  which  prepared  them  for  their  mission.  It 
was  through  this  that  they  were  able  to  substitute  for 
their  old  ethnic  religion,  upon  which  their  little  exclu- 
sive states  had  been  built  up,  and  upon  which  only 
such  states  could  be  built  up,  a  religious  principle 
upon  which  a  world-wide  institution  could  be  reared. 
And  no  sooner  had  they  attained  this  principle  than 
they  became  the  bearers  of  it  to  all  the  world — at  first, 
indeed,  unconsciously,  but  later  on  consciously.  Like 
Socrates,  Plato  had  "builded  better  than  he  knew." 
In  seeking  to  construct  a  little  Grecian  polity  upon 
philosophic  principles,  he  had  utterly  failed ;  his  Re- 
public  was  a  wild  dream  which  only  dreamers  could 
ever  think  of  trying  to  realize,  or  indeed  desire  to  see 
realized ;  but  in  working  it  out  he  had  discovered  a 
principle  which  was  destined  to  be  the  form  of  some- 
thing far  higher,  something  which  it  would  have  been 
impossible  for  him  to  imagine.  We  may  sum  up  the 
work  of  Socrates  and  Plato  by  saying  that  the  former 
discovered  the  principle  of  the  universal  state,  the 
latter  the  principle  of  the  universal   Church ;_  the 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  145 

former  the  principle  of  moral  liberty,  the  latter  the  ! 
principle  of  unitjjEithJjcod.  In  this  sense,  and  only  [ 
loTThis  sense,  can  it  be  said  that  Plato  carried  on  the 
work  of  Socrates.  Thus  these  two  men  together  not 
only  prepared  the  way  for  the  transition  from  particu- 
larism to  universalism  in  politics,  but  also  initiated  a 
separation  between  the  civil  and  religious  institutions 
which  had  been  confounded  in  the  old  states^  It  is 
of  course  true  that  there  was,  strictly  speaking,  no 
Church,  even  in  the  larger  Hellenic  world,  for  four 
centuries  after  Plato ;  but  it  is  likewise  true  that  the 
form  of  the  Church  came  into  existence  in  Plato's 
lifetime,  and  only  waited  for  a  living  content  to  be- 
come a  reality.  That  content  was  the  realization  of 
the  mystic  vision  of  which  Plato  had  dreamed.*  We 
are  therefore  prepared  to  find  that  after  Plato  there 
grew  up,  alongside  the  state,  societies  based  upon  this 
vision,  the  so-called  philosophic  schools.  While  the 
followers  of  Socrates  owned  no  social  bond,  those  of 
Plato,  Aristotle,  Zeno,  Epicurus,  and  all  the  great  sys-  i 
tem-builders  form  themselves  into  schools  ;  and  these 
are  the  forerunners  and,  in  large  degree,  the  models 
for  the  church-congregations,  at  least  in  the  pagan 
world,  t  The  history  of  these  schools  is,  from  the  date  | 
of  their  rise,  the  most  important  part  of  the  history  of 
Greece.  It  was  through  these  that  she  exerted  upon 
the  w^orld  that  influence  which  constitutes  her  historic 
importance. 

*  See  Bratuschek's  lecture  on  Die  Bedeutung  der  plato- 
ni>iche?i  PhilosopMe  fur  die  religiosen  Fragen  der  Gegenwarty 
Berlin,  1873. 

f  The  Jewish  Christian  Church,  with  its  "  prophesying,"  was 
something  very  different  from  the  Gentile  Church  with  its 


146      EDUCATION  OF  TSE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

In  treating  of  Plato's  attempt  to  evolve  the  plan  of 
a  state  founded  on  philosophical  principles  we  have 
confined  our  attention  solely  to  tlie  RepuUic.  But 
this  embodies  only  one  of  the  attempts  he  made. 
Another,  and  one  differing  in  many  important  respects 
from  the  former,  is  presented  to  us  in  the  Laws,  a 
work  which  seems  to  have  been  written  in  his  declin- 
ing years,  when  the  impracticability  of  his  earlier 
scheme  had  become  apparent  to  him.  It  is  a  work  of 
far  less  literary  merit  than  the  EepuMic,  but  it  is 
hardly  less  interesting.  Its  relation  to  the  latter 
may  be  made  clear  by  a  simple  consideration.  The 
aim  of  Socrates'  efforts  had  been  to  find  a  principle 
by  which  the  anarchic  individualism  of  sophistic 
teaching  might  be  overcome.  He  did  so  by  discov- 
ering the  existence  of  universal  reason  in  man. 
Plato,  by  substituting  for  this  his  supermental  ideas, 
whose  civic  em.bodiment  could  be  only  a  despotic 
state,  passed  to  the  opposite  extreme — viz.,  to  the  ex- 
aggerated socialism  of  Pythagoras.  Having  in  his 
RepiMic  practically  indorsed  this,  he  was  led  by  de- 
grees to  a  more  careful  study  of  Pythagoreanism  itself 
and  its  practical  results.  So  deeply  did  this  study 
affect  him  that  he  finally,  to  a  large  extent,  departed 

preaching,  which  is  altogether  of  Greek  origin,  being  borrowed 
from  the  philosophical  and  rhetorical  schools.  (See  Hatch, 
Hibhert  Lectures,  1888,  pp.  107-109.)  To  the  form  and  ceremonial 
of  the  Gentile  Church  there  went,  no  doubt,  important  elements 
derived  from  the  Jewish  synagogue  and  the  Greek  mysteries : 
but  the  supernatural  and  spiritual  bond,  which  is  the  essential 
principle  of  the  Church,  existed  already  in  the  Greek  philosophic 
schools.  It  might,  indeed,  be  maintained  that  the  synagogue 
itself  owed  its  origin  to  Greek  influence.  It  certainly  arose 
when  that  influence  was  at  its  highest  in  Palestine. 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  147 

il9P^  the  principles  of  _Socrates  and  embraced  those 
of  Pythagoras.  The  result  was  the  Laios^  in  which 
alone  of  all  Plato's  works  Socrates  does  not  appear. 

Two  circumstances  seem  to  have  contributed  to 
bring  about  this  change :  (1)  the  growing  social  dis- 
order in  Greece,  against  which  the  scheme  propounded 
in  the  Republic  was  obviously  ineffective ;  (2)  the  mani- 
fest impotence  of  ideas  as  ethical  sanctions.  Length- 
ened experience  gradually  convinced  Plato  of  two 
things :  (1)  that  society  can  be  reformed  only  through 
the  forces  by  which  it  has  been  built  up  and  is  still 
maintained,  never  by  principles  imported  from  with- 
out ;  (2)  that  the  most  important  of  these  forces  is 
religion  with  its  gods,  a  force  for  which  metaphysics, 
with  its  ideas,  is  no  substitute.  Without,  therefore, 
denying — nay,  indeed,  still  affirming — that  the  Repub- 
lic presents  the  ultimate  ideal  state,  he  admits  that 
such  a  state  is  possible  only  when  the  citizens  are 
"gods  or  sons  of  gods,"*  and  then  proceeds  to  draw 
out  the  plan  of  a  state  which,  as  being  based  upon  the 
forces  at  work  in  society,  and  especially  upon  religion 
and  the  gods,  might  seem  to  offer  more  promise  of  \ 
realization.  Accordingly,  in  the  Latvs,  the  ideas  of  the  | 
Republic  are  replaced  by  the  popular  gods,  the  mystic 
vision  by  popular  good  sense  {<j>p6vrj(rLs)y  the  philo- 
sophic class  by  (1)  a  hereditary  prince,  (2)  a  com- 
missioner of  public  education  and  a  senate  chosen  by 
vote,  and  (3)  a  body  of  officials  determined  by  lot,  and, 
finally,  the  industrial  class  by  slaves  and  resident  for- 
eigners.    Of  his  previous  three  classes  the  only  one 

*  Etre  rrov  Oeol  fj  vaiSes  dewv,  Laws,  739  D.     See  the  whole 
passage,  and  mark  the  expression  "  sons  of  gods." 


148      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

that  remains  is  the  military.  All  these  changes  are 
concessions  to  the  real,  and  it  is  manifest  that  Plato 
in  making  them  has  abandoned  the  ideal  standpoint 
and  placed  himself  on  a  basis  of  history  and  experi- 
ence. 

By  nothing  is  this  shown  more  clearly  than  by  the 
part  which  the  gods  and  their  worship  play  in  the  new 
scheme.  Mature  reflection  upon  popular  ethical  sanc- 
tions and  an  acquaintance  with  the  results  of  Pytha- 
gorean teaching  had  convinced  him  that  among  men 
no  social  or  political  order  was  possible  that  was  not 
based  upon  religion  and  the  worship  of  gods,  acknowl- 
edged to  be  real  personalities.  Accordingly,  he  lays  down 
the  most  detailed  rules  for  the  worship  of  the  accepted 
gods,*  demons,  and  heroes,  and  ordains  that  any  word 
or  act,  on  the  part  of  any  citizen,  showing  disrespect 
for  divine  things  shall  be  punished  in  the  most  rigor- 
ous way.  lie  goes  even  much  further  than  this.  Iden- 
tifying certain  of  the  gods  with  the  heavenly  bodies,  or, 
as  Dante  would  say,  with  the  intelligences  that  move 
the  spheres,  and  conceiving  that  much  of  the  order  of 
things  on  the  earth  is  due  to  their  influence,  he  prac- 
tically makes  astrology  an  essential  part  of  religion, 
and  the  worship  of  the  "  hosts  of  heaven "  f  part  of 
religious  ritual.  And  this  ritual,  in  consequence,  be- 
came not  only  extremely  detailed  and  complicated — in- 

*  Oi  KOTck  vSfiov  vvTfs  Oioi,  Laws,  X,  904  A.  Cf.  Golden  Words, 
line  1,  9eohs,  vSfxtf  &s  BidKeivrai. 

f  Whence  Plato  derived  his  astrological  notions  I  am  unable 
to  say,  whether  from  Pythagoras  or  directly  from  the  Egyptians, 
Babylonians,  or  Phoenicians  ;  but  it  seems  to  me  that  the  notion 
of  introducing  astrology  into  religion  was  in  all  probability  duo 
to  Pythagorean  influence. 


\ 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  149 

asmuch  as  each  deity,  daemon,  and  hero  had  to  be  wor- 
shiped with  certain  fixed  rites,  performed  at  stated 
seasons,  and  with  no  other — but  also  theurgic  and 
mantic,  as  indeed  every  religion  necessarily  does  that 
pays  homage  to  the  host  of  heaven  or  to  nature-powers 
of  any  sort. 

This  view  of  the  relation  of  the  heavenly  powers  oi 
bodies  to  the  affairs  of  life  introduced  a  great  changt 
in  education.  Whereas  in  the  Republic  education  hac 
culminated  in  dialectics  leading  to  the  vision  of  super-' 

I  sensual  ideas,  in  the  Laws  it  culminates  in  the  mathe- 

7matical  sciences — arithmetic,  geometry,  and  astronomy 
— the  first  two  being  mainly  preparatory  to  the  last. 
It  need  not  be  said  that  for  Plato  astronomy  is  astrol- 

•#  ogy,  whence,  in  recommending  the  study  of  the  mathe- 
matical sciences,  he  does  so  in  the  interest  of  religion, 

*  or,' more  strictly  speaking,  of  superstition.  Mathe- 
matics are  to  be  studied  in  order  that  we  may  place 
ourselves  in  the  proper  relation  to  the  stellar  intelli- 
gences.* 

In  the  political  scheme  set  forth  in  the  Laios  a 
place  is,  of  course,  found  for  the  family  and  for  pri- 
vate property ;  but  into  details  like  these  we  can  not 
enter,  our  purpose  being  merely  to  show  how  the  work 
affected  the  education  of  the  Greek  people — that  is, 
what  elements  it  introduced  into  their  thought.  And 
this  may  be  stated  in  a  few  words.  Inasmuch  as  the 
scheme  propounded  in  the  Laws  is  little  more  than  a 

*  "  This  is  what  I  say  is  incumbent  both  upon  our  citizens 
and  upon  our  young  men  with  respect  to  the  gods  in  the  heavens, 
that  they  should  learn  so  much  about  them  all  as  not  to  utter 
blasphemy  about  them,  but  to  treat  them  always  reverently,  in 
sacrifices  and  pious  prayers." — Laws,  VII,  821  D.  B. 


150      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

compound  of  the  constitutions  of  Athens  and  Sparta, 
sanctioned  by  a  religion  bordering  closely  upon  Sa- 
baeanism,  it  is  obvious  that  it  is  mainly  in  this  last  ele- 
ment that  the  novelty  of  the  Laws  consists.  Kor  is 
this  a  small  matter  if  we  consider  it  in  its  conse- 
quences.    Let  us  do  so. 

The  tendency  of  the  teaching  of  Socrates,  as  well  as 
of  that  of  Plato  in  the  RepiiUic,  had  been  to  draw  men 
away  from  the  old  nature-divinities  of  polytheism,  and 
to  direct  their  attention  upon  a  single  principle,  as  gov- 
erning the  universe — in  a  word,  to  turn  them  to  mono- 
theism. And,  indeed,  had  the  fundamental  thought  of 
Socrates  been  faithfully  carried  out  to  its  legitimate 
consequences,  it  is  hard  to  see  what  other  result  could 
have  been  reached  than  a  spiritual  monotheism,  since 
that  is  the  necessary  presupposition  of  all  "  idiopsy- 
chological  ethics  "  (to  use  an  excellent  expression  of 
Dr.  Martineau's).  But,  as  we  have  seen,  no  such  good 
fortune  befell  the  thought  of  Socrates.  Plato  sub- 
stituted for  it  one  of  his  own,  which  did  not,  and 
could  not,  lead  to  a  spiritual  monotheism,  but,  at 
best,  only  to  a  mono-ideism,  such  as  Hegel  afterward 
reached ;  and  when  he  found  this  inadequate  to  fur- 
nishing a  principle  for  the  reorganization  of  society, 
he  had  no  resource  but  to  fall  back  into  material  poly- 
theism, which  he  then  attempted  to  raise  to  the  height 
of  a  moral  sanction  by  connecting  it  with  a  crude 
physical  theory  and  with  a  worship  consisting  mainly 
of  theurgic  or  magic  rites  and  divination.  It  was 
due  mainly  to  Plato  that  the  Greeks,  in  their  effort 
to  find  a  true  moral  sanction,  were  left  to  choose 
between  a  lifeless  abstraction  called  "  the  Good  "  and  a 
crude  material  polytheism,  and  that  they  thus  missed 


THE  PHILOSOPHIC  STATE.  151 

the  "  living  God,"  whom  Socrates,  and  before  him  the 
prophetic  ^schylus,  came  so  near  finding. 

We  have  already  seen  that  the  adoption  of  the  . 
former  of  these  alternatives  was  the  source  of  that 
mysticism  which  played  such  a  large  part  in  subse- 
quent philosophy  and  religion.  We  can  now  see  that 
the  adoption  of  the  latter  gave  currency  and  respecta- 
bility to  the  theurgic,  magic,  and  mantic  rites  which 
to  this  day  have  maintained  themselves  in  much  of 
the  religion  of  the  civilized  world.  No  doubt  these 
rites  existed  in  all  nature-religions,  not  excepting  that 
of  Greece  ;  but  they  would,  in  all  probability,  have  disj 
appeared  soon  after  the  time  of  Socrates,  at  least  froni 
the  religion  of  thinking  men,  had  they  not  receivea 
prestige  and  a  fresh  lease  of  life  from  the  authority  or. 
Plato.  Thus  they  came  to  be  perpetuated,  and  thus  v 
it  was  that  the  religion  of  the  thoughtful  Greeks  after 
Plato's  time  was,  to  a  large  extent,  a  compound  of  a 
lofty  mysticism,  striving  after  the  beatific  vision  of  a 
bald  abstraction,  and  a  crude  material  superstition, 
expressing  itself  in  magic  ceremonies.  Such  was  the 
result  of  Plato's  attempt  to  found  a  social  order  upon 
abstract  philosophic  principles. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE    ATTEMPT    TO    FOUND    AN    EDUCATIONAL    STATE 
ON   INDUCTIVE    SCIENTIFIC    PEINCIPLES   AND    ITS 

RESULTS. 

Plato's  attempt  to  found  a  state  on  the  mystic 
vision  of  divine  ideas,  whatever  its  more  remote  re- 
sults, was  a  failure ;  and  of  this  he  himself  became 
ultimately  so  well  aware  that  he  attempted  to  found 
one  upon  popular  superstition.  This  likewise  was 
necessarily  a  failure,  so  that  at  the  death  of  Plato  the 
task  which  Socrates  had  undertaken  remained  unac- 
complished, and  the  principle  of  social  union  which 
he  had  discovered  undeveloped  and  unapplied.  But 
in  elaborating  his  second  scheme  Plato  had  made  use 
of  a  principle  which,  had  he  known  how  to  take  full 
advantage  of  it,  might  have  helped  him  to  a  better 
result — the  principle  that  all  social  reform  must  come 
from  a  wise  direction  of  the  immanent  forces  by  which 
society  is  built  up.  Jhe  full  comprehension  and  ap- 
plication of  this  principle  were  left  for  Aristotle. 

This  philosopher  abandoned  the  position  of  Plato 
without  returning  to  that  of  Socrates.  Without  alto- 
gether setting  aside  Platonic  ideas,  he  freed  them  from 
manv  of  the  difficulties  that  attached  to  them  as  con- 
ceived by  Plato.     By  treating  their  separate  existence 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  153 

in  a  snpercelestial  world  as  pure  mythology,  and  plant- 
ing them  as  organizing  forces  in  the  material  world, 
and  as  concepts  in  the  intellect — realized  in  the  divine ; 
potential,  and  realizable  in  the  human — he  prepared 
the  way  for  the  conclusion  that  if  divine  ideas  arc  everif 
to  be  found  at  all,  they  must  be  looked  for  in  nature 
and  in  mind.  In  nature  they  are  seen  on  their  ex- 
ternal side,  in  the  form  of  becoming;  in  mind,  on 
their  internal  side,  in  the  form  of  being ;  and  they  are 
adequately  seen  only  when  the  two  sides  are  simul- 
taneously presented.  These  ideas,  in  so  far  as  they 
relate  to  human  practice,  appear  on  their  inner  side  as 
ethical  ends  or  motives  ;  on  their  outer,  as  social  insti- 
tutions, and  these  two  must  be  seen  in  their  correla- 
tion, if  ever  a  theory  of  practice  is  to  be  reached,  and 
practice  itself  place  upon  a  secure  footing. 

According  to  Aristotle,  all  intelligent  action  is  ac- 
tion for  the  sake  of  an  end,  which  may  be  defined  as 
"  the  Good  "  {to  dyaOov).     The  good  of  man  is  Happi- 
ness  (evSat/xovta),  which  consists  in  the  realization  of 
his  highest  or  distinguishing  faculty — viz.,  intellect. 
In  his  Ethics  Aristotle  seeks  to  show  how  the  indi- 
vidual must  discipline  himself  in  order  to  reach  this 
end,  while  in  the  Politics  he  undertakes  to  present 
the  external,  the  social,  and  economic  conditions  under 
which  such  discipline  promises  to  be  most  successful.  T 
Thus  for  Aristotle,  as  for  Plato,  the  state  is  primarily  / 
a  school  of  virtue,  and  the  supreme  virtue  consists  'in  f 
the  exercise  of  the  intellect. 

In  both  the  Ethics  and  the  Politics  Aristotle  goes 
to  work  inductively.  In  the  former,  after  defining  the 
nature  of  "  the  Good,"  he  proceeds  to  classify  the  vir- 
tues and  the  vices,  and  to  show  how  each  is  related  to 


154      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

that  Good — the  former  conducing  to  it,  the  latter  lead- 
ing away  from  it.  In  the  latter  he  considers  the  vari- 
ous forms  of  government  and  their  relation  to  each 
other,  as  well  as  to  the  characters,  temperaments,  and 
culture  of  different  peoples.*  These  do  not  concern 
us  at  present.  We  have  only  to  consider  what  he  con- 
ceives the  function  of  the  state  to  be  in  educating  men 
so  that  they  may  reach  "the  Good."  In  trying  to 
define  this,  he  begins  with  a  very  sharp  and,  on  the 
whole,  very  just  criticism  of  the  socialistic  doctrines 
propounded  in  Plato's  Eepublic  and  Latvs.  He  points 
out  the  fallacy  involved  in  the  conception  of  the  state 
as  the  individual  writ  large,  and  emphatically  denies 
the  truth  of  the  doctrine  that  a  state  is  better  in  pro- 
portion as  it  approximates  perfect  unity.  On  the  con- 
trary, he  says,  the  more  completely  a  thing  is  a  unity, 
the  less  self-sufficient,  the  less  capable  of  prolonging 
its  existence  it  is.  If  we  reflect  that  the  individual  is 
more  of  a  unity  than  the  family,  and  the  family  than 
the  state,  we  shall  see  that  unity  and  self-sufficiency 
are  in  inverse  ratio  to  each  other.  Moreover,  when 
the  state  is  regarded  as  an  individual  the  happiness  of 
the  whole  will  be  aimed  at,  and  not  that  of  the  parts — 
a  hand  or  a  foot.  But  to  talk  of  the  happiness  of  a 
state,  as  something  possible  apart  from  the  happiness 
of  the  human  beings  that,  compose  it,  is  to  talk  non- 
sense. Happiness  is  not  like  evenness  in  number.  A 
number  may  be  even  though  all  its  components  are 

*  His  review  of  the  different  forms  of  government  was  based 
upon  a  very  wide  induction.  Before  undertaking  it  he  wrote 
out  the  "  constitutions  "  of  two  hundred  and  fifty  (some  say  two 
hundred  and  fifty-eight)  different  states.  One  of  these,  the 
"  O'onstitution  of  the  Athenians,"  has  recently  been  discovered. 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  155 

odd  (units) ;  but  a  state  can  not  be  happy  if  its  mem- 
bers are  unhappy,  as  those  of  the  Platonic  state  are. 
Aristotle  shows  further  not  only  that  the  Platonic 
state  could  not  possibly  be  realized,  but  also  that  if  it 
were,  it  would  neither  obviate  the  evils  nor  secure  the 
blessings  which  he  believes  it  would.  He  points  out 
specially  the  evils  that  would  arise  from  community  of 
wives  or  property,  and  shows  that  they  would  far  over- 
balance the  advantages. 

It  might  seem  from  this  criticism  that  Aristotle 
would  be  prepared  to  reverse  the  Platonic  doctrine 
that  the  individual  exists  for  the  state,  and  to  say  that 
the  state  exists  for  the  individual.  But  he  is  both  too 
much  of  a  Greek  and  too  much  of  a  philosopher  to  do 
this.  ■  He  maintains  that  man  and  the  state  do  not 
stand  to  each  other  in  the  relation  of  end  and  means, 
but  are  essentially  correlates.  "  Man  is  hy  nature  a/ 
political  animal,"  and  the  notion  of  a  man  without  a 
state  (aTToXts)  is  as  absurd  as  that  of  a  state  without  a 
man.  He  even  commits  himself  to  the  paradox  that 
the  state  is  prior  to  the  individual,*  by  which  he  means 
that  it  is  man's  civic  nature  by  which  his  individual 
manhood  is  rendered  possible.  It  is  through  the  state 
that  man  is  man.  Without  the  state  he  would  have  to 
be  a  beast  or  a  god.  In  one  aspect,  therefore,  the  rela- 
tion of  the  individual  to  the  state  is  organic,  in  another 
it  is  federal.  It  is  this  combination  of  the  organic  and 
the  federal  that  constitutes  the  political.  A  polity  is 
more  than  an  organism, f  more  than  an  individual  how- 


*  'H  ir6\is  KoiX  <p-u<Tfi  KoL  irpSrepov  ^  e/cao-Tos,  Pol.,  I,  2,  1253a  25. 
f  It  is  curious  how  lono:  it  has  taken  the  world — nay,  how 
long  it  has  taken  political  thinkers— to  rise  to  Aristotle's  point 


156       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

ever  large  we  may  write  him.  I  am  not  aware  that 
Aristotle  has  anywhere  hazarded  the  assertion  that  a 
unity  is  always  higher  in  proportion  to  the  independ- 
ence of  the  elements  which  it  unites,  and  that  the 
highest  possible  unity  would  be  one  whose  elements 
were  absolutely  independent;  but  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  this  follows  from  his  teaching,  and  would 
have  been  cheerfully  admitted  by  him.  To  convince 
ourselves  that  he  held  this  view  with  respect  to  polit- 
ical unities  we  have  only  to  read  the  second  chapter 
of  the  second  book  of  the  Politics,  where,  in  dealing 
with  the  question  of  communism  and  private  property, 
he  maintains  that,  while  possession  ought  to  be  private, 
the  citizens  of  a  community  should  be  so  well  educated 
as  to  be  ready  to  use  their  wealth  for  the  public  weal. 
"  And  to  see  that  they  have  this  education  is  the  proper 
task  of  the  legislator."*  Obviously,  therefore,  the 
business  of  the  state  is  not  to  make  its  citizens  de- 
pendent parts  of  a  whole,  as  Plato  had  held,  but_  to 
develop  in  them  moral  wills,  and  thereby  to  make 
them  independent.  In  a  word,  Aristotle  regards  the 
f  A  state  as  a  moral  unity,  whose  principle  is  free  will,  and 
f  is  therefore  the  determined  foe  of  all  state-socialism. 
In  the  ideal  state  men  would  be  absolutely  free. 
Of  the  state-forms  capable  of  realization  among  men 

of  view  in  this  matter.  We  stOl  hear  the  state  spoken  of  as  an 
organism,  and  theories  propounded  with  regard  to  it  as  if  it 
really  were  so.  See,  for  example,  Bluntschli,  Theory  of  the 
State,  p.  12  sqq.  (Eng.  trans.).  This  writer  even  goes  so  far  as  to 
maintain  that  the  state  is  masculine  and  the  Church  feminino ! 
Ibid.,  p.  22  sq. 

*  "Oirojs  Se  yiuccvTai  Toiovroi,  rod  yofiodcTOV  tovt*  eftyoy  t5i6u  iariy. 
Pol.,  ii,  5,  12G3a  39  sq. 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  157 

such  as  they  are,  that  is  the  best  and  highest  which 
allows  the  individual  the  greatest  possible  amount  of 
liberty. 

In  seeking  to  discover  what  form  of  state  best  ac- 
complishes this,  Aristotle  classifies  and  passes  in  review 
all  the  forms  of   government  with  which   he  is  ac- 
quainted, or  which  he   conceives  possible,  and  finds 
that  there  are  in  all  six  of  them — three  good  and  three'f 
bad  (irapeK/Sda-eLg).     The  difference  between  a  good  and! 
a  bad  government  is  that,  while  the  former  aims  at  \ 
the  good  of  the  whole  people,  the  latter  seeks  that  of  a  1 
class.     The  good  governments  are — (1)  Monarchy,  in 
which  one  rules ;  (2)  aristocracy,  in  which  some  (the 
best)  rule ;  and  (3)  constitutional  republic  (TroXireta), 
in  which  all  rule.     The  bad  governments  correspond- 
ing respectively  to  these  are — (1)  Tyranny,  (2)  oli-  \ 
garchy,  (3)  democracy.     The  difference  between  the 
last  two,  however,  is  not  so  much  a  matter  of  number 
as  of  wealth.     Oligarchy  is  government  by  the  rich ; 
democracy,  by  the  poor.     In  arranging  these  govern- 
ments in  an  order  of  descending  goodness,  Aristotle 
applies  the  principle  that  "  the  corruption  of  the  best 
is  the  worst."  *    The  result  is  :  (1)  Monarchy,  (2)  aris- 
tocracy, (3)  constitutional  republic,  (4)  democracy,  (5) 
oligarchy,  (6)  tyranny. 

*  "  Corruptio  optimi  pessima  esty  In  this  generalized  form 
it  became  an  adage  in  Scholastic  philosophy.  Dante  {Purg., 
XXX,  118  sqq.y  and  Shakespeare  ("  Lilies  that  fester  smell  far 
worse  than  weeds,"  Son.,  xciv,  14)  both  adopt  it.  In  its  original 
form  it  was  applied  to  governments — "the  corruption  of  the 
first  and  most  divine  mii§t  be  the  worst "  (avdyio]  yap  r^v  ixkv  rf/s 
vpdoTTjs  Kttl  Oeiordrris  TrapiK^aTiv  dvai  xetp^o-Tijv,  Pol.,  iv,  2,  1289a 
39  sqq.). 


158       EDUCATION  OF  ^HE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

According  to  Aristotle,  then,  monarchy  is  the  best 
form  of  government  for  educating  men  to  freedom, 
and  tyranny  the  worst.  This  conchision  was  due  not 
to  any  philosophic  reasoning  from  abstract  principles, 
or  to  any  preconception  of  human  nature,  but  to  ex- 
perience, and,  perhaps  even  in  a  larger  degree  than  was 
justified,  to  the  experience  of  his  own  time.  The  same 
social  convulsion  and  confusion  that  had  driven  Plato 
to  turn  his  back  on  all  actual  governments  and  con- 
struct his  fantastic  and  impossible  RepuUic  were  be- 
fore Aristotle,  and  even  in  an  aggravated  form.  But 
the  effect  upon  him  was  altogether  different  from  what 
it  had  been  upon  Plato ;  and  the  reason  of  this  is  not 
far  to  seek.  While  Plato,  with  his  poetical  tendencies, 
could  find  no  refuge  from  the  actual  save  in  the  ab- 
stract ideal,  Aristotle,  with  his  belief  that  the  ideal 
was  not  abstract  at  all,  looked  for  help  in  a  larger  and 
more  comprehensive  view  of  the  real.  And  he  was 
greatly  aided  in  this  by  the  circumstances  of  his  life, 
which  in  this  connection  deserve  careful  consider- 
ation. 

Though  Aristotle  spent  a  large  part  of  his  life — 
nearly  tliirty  years  in  all — in  Athens,  and  though,  as 
his  works  clearly  show,  he  took  a  deep  and  sympathetic 
interest  in  its  government  and  people,  he  never  was — 
never  could  be,  and  probably  never  even  wished  to  be 
— anything  more  than  a  stranger  or  resident  foreigner 
(/xerotKos)  there.  He  was  a  Macedonian  not  only  by 
birth,  but,  as  many  circumstances  show,  also  in  sym- 
pathy. He  had  seen  the  best  side  of  the  great  Mace- 
donian monarchs,  and  in  his  later  life,  when  he  was 
writing  his  Politics^  he  witnessed  not  only  their  easy 
and  complete  triumph  over  the  democracies  and  oli- 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  159 

garchies  of  Greece,  but  also  their  beneficent  influence  / 
in  restoring  peace,  order,  and  prosperity  to  the  whole 
people.  Before  his  very  eyes  the  monarchy  of  which 
he  was  a  subject  proved  itself  not  only  stronger,  but 
more  civilizing  than  any  other  form  of  government  with 
which  he  was  acquainted.  Under  these  circumstances 
it  would  have  been  strange  indeed  if,  with  his  deep 
respect  for  experience,  he  had  not  assigned  to  mon- 
archy the  first  place  among  the  forms  of  government. 
At  all  events  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  his  experience 
of  the  power  and  influence  of  Macedonia  had  a  consid- 
erable part  in  shaping  his  political  theories. 

It  seems  at  first  sight  strange  that  a  man  who  laid 
so  much  stress  on  the  distinction  between  Greeks  and 
barbarians  as  Aristotle  did  should  have  shown  so  much 
respect  for  the  Macedonians,  who  were  generally  con- 
sidered at  least  half  barbarians ;  but  it  must  be  borne 
in  mind  that  a  very  large  proportion  of  the  subjects  of 
the  Macedonian  kings  were  pure-blooded  Greeks,  and 
Greeks  of  a  very  superior  type,  and  that  both  Philip 
and  Alexander  had  not  only  received  a  most  careful 
Greek  education,  but  were  proud  to  proclaim  them- 
selves the  bearers  and  champions  of  Greek  culture,  a  j 
claim  which  the  Greeks  themselves  allowed  when  they 
admitted  them  to  participation  in  the  Olympic  games. 
Thus  the  Greece  of  Aristotle  was  the  Macedonian  mon- 
archy, of  which  the  Greece  of  Plato  was  only  a  de- 
pendent province ;  and  we  can  well  imagine  that  the 
battle  of  Chaeronea,  which  to  the  latter  must  have 
seemed  the  greatest  of  disasters,  may  have  appeared 
to  Aristotle  the  dawn  of  a  better  order  of  things.  In 
his  recently  discovered  Constitution  of  Athens  he 
closes  the  history  of  that  city  with  the  restoration  of 
13 


160      EDUCATION   OF  >THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

the  democracy  by  Thrasybulus  in  B.  c.  403,  and  does 
not  even  allude  to  the  Macedonian  conquest. 

Aristotle's  experiences  with  the  Macedonian  mon- 
archy placed  him  in  a  diflBcult  position,  which  is  curi- 
ously but  plainly  manifested  in  his  Politics.  While 
he  maintains  that  monarchy  is,  absolutely  speaking, 
the  highest  form  of  government,  and  that  aristocracy 
comes  next  to  it,  he  nevertheless  admits  that,  consider- 
ing the  difficulty  of  finding  a  real  monarch  or  an  aris- 
tocracy whose  unselfishness  can  be  depended  on,  the 
best  form  generally  realizable  is  the  constitutional  re- 
public. We  can  easily  see  that  in  making  this  admis- 
sion he  is  influenced  by  the  impression  which  Philip 
and  Alexander  had  made  upon  him.  Such  men,  he 
evidently  believes,  are  not  found  every  day,  and  can 
not  be  made  to  order.  He  is  probably  thinking  of 
them  when  he  describes  the  man  whom  he  considers 
fit  to  be  a  monarch.  "  If,"  he  says,  "  there  be  any  one 
man,  or  some  small  number  of  men  not  large  enough 
to  constitute  a  state,  so  exceedingly  transcendent  in 
worth  that  neither  the  worth  nor  the  political  capacity 
of  all  the  rest  bears  any  comparison  to  his  or  theirs  (as 
the  case  may  be),  such  men  are  no  longer  to  be  con- 
sidered part  of  the  state;  for  it  would  be  an  injustice 
to  place  them  on  an  equal  footing  with  those  who  are 
so  inferior  to  them  in  worth  and  political  capacity. 
Nay,  such  a  man  must  take  the  place  of  a  god  among 
men.  Thus  we  see  that  wherever  there  is  legislation 
it  presupposes  men  generically  and  potentially  equal, 
whereas  the  men  just  referred  to  are  beyond  the  sphere 
of  law  ;  for  they  are  the  law ;  and  certainly  it  would 
be  ridiculous  for  any  one  to  lay  down  laws  for  them. 
They  would  probably  reply  as  Antisthenes  said  the 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  161 

lions  did  when  the  hares  and  rabbits  took  to  harangu- 
ing in  favor  of  equal  rights  for  all."  * 

We  can  readily  see  that  in  accepting  and  propound- 
ing a  doctrine  like  this  Aristotle  was  standing  on  the 
boundary  line  between  two  epochs  and  ideals  of  polit-i 
ical  life.  On  one  side  of  him,  stretching  away  into  the 
past,  were  the  little  pedagogic  republics  of  Greece,  withf 
their  narrow  interests,  regulated  lives,  and  intense, 
supercilious  patriotism ;  on  the  other,  looming  up  in 
the  future,  was  a  great  Hellenic  monarchy,  with  broad 
interests,  free  lives,  and  an  all-inclusive  patriotism. 
But  he  saw  too  clearly  the  disadvantages,  as  well  as 
the  advantages,  of  each  to  be  an  enthusiastic  partisan 
or  apostle  of  either  by  itself.  He  evidently  saw  that 
cultured,  Hellenic  life  could  not  be  carried  on  without 
the  city-state  (TroAt?),  and  he  could  not  help  seeing  that 
such  states  were  entirely  unable  to  maintain  themselves, 
either  against  each  other  or  against  foreign  aggression, 
unless  they  were  united  and  held  together  by  a  power 
which  they  themselves  could  not  create,  and  which 
therefore  had  to  come  to  them  from  without.  Such  a 
power  he  looked  for  in  some  great  hero,  like  Philip  or 
Alexander,  who,  standing  among  men  like  a  god  above 
all  institutions  and  laws,  should  govern  them  by  divine 
right.  But  as  the  divine  man  is  rare,t  ^^^  can  not  be 
commanded,  ordinary  men  must  be  content  to  make 
and  obey  laws,  the  best  they  can  evolve  or  secure. 
Accordingly,  in  attempting  to  describe  the  highest 
state  which  he  conceives  to  be  realizable  without  the 
aid  of  the  divine  man  (who  is  beyond  science  as  beyond 

*  Pol,  iii,  13,  1283a  3  sqq. 

f  'S.irdviov  rh  OeTov  &ySpo  chai,  Eth.  Nic,  vii,  1,  1145a  27  sq. 


162      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

law),  he  keeps  pretty  close  to  the  model  of  the  Greek 
city-state,  merely  suggesting  such  improvements  upon 
actual  conditions  as  shall  make  that  institution  truly 
and  consciously  a  school  of  virtue. 
'  In  examining  Aristotle's  political  scheme,  we  he- 
come  aware  of  two  characteristics  of  the  man — (1)  his 
extreme  regard  for  facts  and  actual  conditions,  and 
(2)  his  lack  of  that  prophetic  vision  which,  amid  the 
chaos  and  confusion  of  a  transition  period,  can  descry 

"  The  Spirit  of  the  years  to  come 
Yearning  to  mix  himself  with  Life." 

The  former  of  these  made  him  not  only  accept  many 
current  notions  and  practices  which  were  soon  to  be 
outgrown,  but  even  to  champion  them  as  founded  in 
Nature,  and  to  seek  a  philosophical  explanation  of 
them.  Thus,  for  example,  he  became  an  advocate  of 
chattel  slavery  (although,  as  he  himself  tells  us,  there 
were  already  in  his  time  men  who  held  it  to  be  un- 
natural*), of  abortion,  of  the  murder  of  feeble  or 
deformed  children,  of  the  treatment  of  "  barbarians  " 
as  generically  inferior  to  Greeks,  and  fit  only  to  be 
their  slaves,  of  the  exclusion  of  the  industrial  classes, 
as  incapable  of  virtue,  from  all  political  power,  etc. 
The  second  characteristic  made  him  in  great  measure 
blind  to  those  subtle  humanitarian  forces  that  were  at 
work  around  him,  slowly  undermining  the  walls  of 
Greek  exclusiveness,  and  making  straight  the  paths 
for  him  who  was  to  know  neither  Greek  nor  barbarian, 
but  only  man.  Hence  it  was  that,  though  he  could 
not  help  seeing  that  something  like  the  oecumenic 
empire  of  Alexander  must  be  the  determining  influ- 

*  Tols  54  {SoKeT)  trapa  tpiffiv  rh  5€(rTr6Ceiv,  Pol.,  i,  3,  1253b  12. 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  163 

ence  in  all  future  social  life,*  he  could  not  in  the  least 
forecast  the  broadening,  humanizing  influences  of  such 
an  institution.  In  fact,  as  has  been  recently  pointed 
jOut  in  a  work  referred  to  in  a  former  chapter,  Aristotle 
/was  not  a  religious  nature,f  and  accordingly  he  had 
/  none  of  that  large,  vision-giving  sympathy  which  usu- 

(  ally  goes  with  such  natures,  and  none  of  that  humility 
in  the  presence  of  infinite  perfection  and  an  infinite 
task  which  makes  the  differences  between  man  and 
man  seem  trifling  and  embraces  all  that  is  human  in  a 

t  consciousness  of  universal  brotherhood.  Like  his  mas- 
ter Plato,  and  like  the  Greeks  generally,  he  placed  the 

.  supreme  happiness  and  end  of  man  in  an  activity  of 
j  I  /the  intellect,  without,  however,  including  in  it,  as  Plato 
/  '  did,  the  element  of  love.  This  activity,  which  he 
termed  ^ewpta — that  is,  vision  of  the  divine  (see  p.  134, 
note) — is  not  only  a  purely  individual  matter,  but  it  is 
an  end  which  only  a  very  small  and  select  portion  of 


*  There  is  a  curious  remark  in  the  fourth  book  of  the  Physics, 
■where,  speaking  of  the  different  senses  in  which  one  thing  may 
be  in  another,  he  includes  among  these  the  sense  "  in  which  the 
affairs  of  the  Greeks  are  in  a  king,  and  generally  in  the  first  mo- 
tive "  (power) — us  iu  fiaxriKit  rh  rwv  'EW-fivav  Kal  8\<as  iv  r<f  trpdirff) 
KivnriKc^,  Phys.,  iv,  3,  210a  21  sq.  John  Philoponus,  in  his  com- 
mentary, explains  this  to  mean  that  "  the  ruler  is  the  creative 
cause  {iroirjriKhv  cutiov)  of  political  action  "  (irpdyfiara). 

f  Spicker,  Die  Ursachen  des  Verfalls  der  PhilosopMe,  p.  120. 
That  the  philosophy  of  Aristotle  contributed  much  to  Christian 
theology  since  the  fourth  (see  Harnack,  Dogmengeschichte,  iii,  8, 
10),  and  particularly  since  the  thirteenth,  century,  is  most  true ; 
but  it  is  also  true  that  its  contributions  did  much  to  deface 
the  true  character  of  the  Christian  religion  (see  Eucken,  Die 
PhilosopMe  des  Thomas  von  Aquino  und  die  Cultur  der  Nevr- 
zeit,  pp.  13  sqq.    Cf.  Green,  Prolegomena  to  Ethics,  pp.  274  sqq.). 


164      EDUCATION  OF  ^HE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

humanity  can  ever  hope  to  attain,  and  one  that  leaves 
no  room  for  either  love  or  will.  That  Aristotle  should 
have  set  up  this  intellectual  goal  as  the  end  of  all  hu- 
man effort  was  due  perhaps  directly  to  the  influence 
of  Plato,  and  to  his  own  doctrine  that  the  end  or  hap- 
piness of  every  being  consisted  in  the  exercise  of  its 
highest  or  distinguishing  faculty — in  the  case  of  man, 
reason  ;  but  indirectly  and  originally  in  the  generally 
growing  conviction  that  the  true  life  was  diagogic  and 
not  practical,  and  that  the  highest  diagoge  was  contem- 
plation. Thus  his  supreme  ideal  grew  out  of  the  tend- 
encies of  his  time,  and  not  out  of  any  deep  religious 
consciousness. 

Given  a  nature  such  as  Aristotle's,  one  can  almost 
forecast  what  his  ethical  and  educational  theory  will 
be.  His  respect  for  the  actual  will  induce  him  to  give 
it  a  large  influence  in  all  his  teachings,  while  his  belief 
that  man's  supreme  end  is  purely  individual  will  make 
him  set  up  the  magnificent  (/AcyaA.o«/a;xos),  self -centered 
individuality  as  the  ideal  man.  As  he  is  destitute  of 
the  religious  consciousness,  his  ethics  will  have  no 
religious  or  divine  sanction,  but  be  purely  experi- 
mental and  prudential.  In  all  this  we  can  see  clearly 
the  struggle  that  was  then  going  on  between  the  claims 
of  diagogic,  and  those  of  practical,  life ;  between  the 
old  ideal  of  small  republics  of  equal  freemen  and  the 
new  reality  of  an  empire  governed  by  a  magnificent 
personality  standing  above  law ;  and  between  the  old 
personal  gods  of  polytheism  and  the  new  impersonal, 
purely  intelligent  "  Prime  Mover,"  whose  entire  ac- 
tivity and  life  consist  in  thinking  himself. 

It  would  be  surprising  if  Aristotle,  or  any  man, 
writing  in  the  midst  of  such  struggles,  whose  issue 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  165 

still  lay  in  the  future,  should  have  been  able  to  draw 
up  a  perfectly  consistent  scheme  of  ethics  and  politics, 
at  once  keeping  close  to  the  actual,  avoiding  Platonic 
dreams,  and  yet  bringing  into  consciousness  the  spirit 
of  the  time  and  its  direction.  Hence  we  need  not  be 
surprised  to  find  that  the  Etliics  and  Politics  not  only 
contain  glaring  contradictions,  but  that  they  reveal 
nothing  which  could  guide  men  out  of  the  "  dark 
forest "  in  which  they  found  themselves.  As  scientific 
works  they  must  ever  hold  a  very  high  place  on  account 
of  the  immense  mass  of  generalized  knowledge  whiclrjv 
they  present ;  but  as  offering  any  ultimate  solution  of 
ethical  or  political  problems  they  are  comparatively 
valueless.  Upon  the  practical  life  of  the  centuries 
immediately  following  they  exerted  less  influence  than 
even  the  works  of  Plato,  which,  however  fanciful,  con- 
tained a  definite  enough  ideal. 

What,  then,  was  the  nature  of  the  educational  state 
which  Aristotle  attempted  to  construct  on  scientific 
principles,  and  what  was  the  result  of  that  attempt  ? 

We  may  answer  the  former  question  by  saying  that 
Aristotle's  educational  state  is  little  more  than  the 
Athenian  democracy  freed  from  abuses  and  excesses, 
and  made  a  school  of  virtue.  The  education  provided 
in  it  is  simply  the  Athenian  system  improved,  unified, 
and  furnished  with  a  definite  end,  lying  within  the 
scope  of  the  state.  It  is  unfortunate  that  we  have 
only  a  fragment  of  Aristotle's  scheme  of  education, 
and  are  therefore  unable  to  say  how  he  connected  his 
political  education  with  that  which  should  prepare 
men  for  diagogic  contemplation.  As  far  as  this  frag- 
ment goes  it  deals  solely  with  the  education  of  the 
citizen,  as  citizen,  of  a  small  commonwealth. 


166       EDUCATION  OP  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

By  keeping  close  to  the  actual,  Aristotle,  no  doubt, 
hoped  that  his  scheme  might  be  capable  of  realization ; 
but  the  truth  is  it  was  as  unrealizable  as  the  RepuUic 
of  Plato,  and  this  for  two  reasons — (1)  because  the 
days  of  small  independent  republics  were  over,  and  an 
cecumenic  state  was  about  to  take  their  place ;  and 
(2)  because  the  moral  forces  which  might  have  carried 
the  reforms  advocated  by  him  did  not  exist,  and  he 
could  show  no  way  of  bringing  them  into  existence.. 
It  is  easy,  therefore,  to  answer  the  question,  What  was 
the  result  of  his  attempt  to  found  a  state  on  scientific 
principles  ?  As  far  as  the  end  contemplated  was  con- 
cerned, it  was  an  absolute  failure.  Aristotle  affected 
the  world  of  his  own  time,  not  by  propounding  a  polit- 
^ical  system,  but  by  educating  Alexander,  who  applied 
the  only  remedy  which  could  do  anything  for  the  Greek 
republics — that  of  brute  force.  When,  after  Aristotle's 
death,  his  chief  treatises  (so  the  story  goes)  were  hid 
away  in  a  cellar  in  the  Troad,  from  which  they  did  not 
emerge  for  two  hundred  years,  the  world  did  not  feel 
that  it  had  lost  anything,  or  move  on  otherwise  than 
it  would  have  done  had  they  been  in  everybody's 
hands. 

Btit,  for  all  that,  we  should  be  greatly  mistaken  if 
we  should  conclude  that  Aristotle's  works  were  written 
in  vain,  that  they  played  no  part  in  the  world's  history. 
Works  like  his  are  like  seeds  that  take  a  long  time  to 
germinate,  but  which  in  the  long  run  develop  into 
larger  and  more  enduring  plants  than  those  that  are 
more  hasty.  Although,  of  the  four  great  philosophic 
schools  which  flourished  in  the  Hellenic  world  soon 
after  the  death  of  Aristotle,  the  Peripatetic  seems  to 
have  been  the  least  conspicuous,  and  to  have  attracted 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  167 

the  smallest  number  of  disciples,  it  nevertheless  lived 
on  with  energy  sufficient  to  keep  alive  the  thought  of 
its  founder  until  the  day  came  when  the  world  re- 
^  quired  it.     It  was  natural  enough  that  a  philosophy  i 
"'?  which  called  for  research,  experiment,  broad  knowl-  1 
/   edge,  and  sober  thinking — a  philosophy  which  tried  to 
I  make  sure  its  footing  upon  the  earth  before  it  buried 
/  its  head  in  the  clouds — should  have  proved  less  at- 
]  tractive  than  one  which  promised  to  raise  men  in  the 
luxurious  chariot  of  imagination  to  the  dreamy  heaven 
of  pure  ideas.     But  a  philosophy  based  upon  facts,  if  j^ 
it  did  not  allure  the  many,  could  not  at  any  time  fail 
to  command  the  attention  of  serious  thinkers  really 
desirous  of  arriving  at  the  truth  of  the  world,  or  in 
the  end  to  assert  its  natural  right  to  cosmopolitanism. 
For,  however  narrow  Aristotle's  political  ideal  may  have 
been,  and  however  far  behind  the  demands  of  the  time, 
his  science  and  philosophy  were  in  the  highest  degree! 
cosmopolitan.     In  this  respect  they  stood  alone  and 
without  rivals.     Hence,  in  proportion  as  the  widening, 
deepening,  and  complicating  of  human  relations  made 
a  cosmopolitan  system  of  thought  necessary,  the  phi- 
losophy of  Aristotle  inevitably  came  into  the  fore- 
ground.    It  may  be  safely  said  that  from  his  day  to 
ours  no  institution  claiming  to  be   cosmopolitan   or 
catholic  has  succeeded  in  establishing  and  maintain- 
ing itself  without  the  aid  of  his  thought,  and  that  of 
all  the  educational  influences  that  have  come  to  the  | 
world  from  Greece  that  of  Aristotle  is  the  strongest.       ' 
In  truth,  Aristotle  occupies  a  unique  place  in  the  l 
ancient  world.     He  is  the  exponent  of  the  thoughts  I 
and  t^'ndencies  which  marked  the  epoch  in  which  it  / 
passe'' ir'rom  ethnic  to  cosmopolitan  life.     He  writes  J 


168      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

I  the  testament  of  the  former,  and  in  large  degree  the 
/  programme  of  the  latter.     With  him  the  education  of 
J    Greece  comes  to  an  end ;  she  ceases  to  be  a  pupil  and 
^^;^>^  becomes  a  teacher.     She  leaves  her  little  school,  not 
without  some  bitter  regrets  and  a  few  tears,  and  goes 
out  into  the  wide  world  to  conquer  and  instruct.    Her 
history  from  that  time  on,  in  so  far  as  it  has  any  hu- 
man interest,  consists  in  what  she  did  outside  her  own 
boundaries,  in  imparting  her  education  and  culture  to 
.      the  declining  East  and  the  rising  West. 
^'^^      The  important  question  that  now  presents  itself  to 
us  is  this :  Wherein  did  Greek  education  and  culture 
consist?    It  has  been  the  aim  of  this  and  the  previous 
chapters  to  supply  the  materials  for  an  answer  to  this 
question,  and  it  ought  not  now  to  be  difficult  to  render. 
'       We  may  express  it  in  a  few  words :  Greek  culture,  the 
result  of  Greek  education,  consisted  in  elevating  the 
individual  from  thraldom  to  the  blind^forces  of  Xature, 
whether  in  the  form  of  religious  superstition  or  social 
I     prescription,  to   a   position   of   self-determination   or 
I     moral  freedom.     We  have  tried  to  trace  the  course  of 
this  process.     It  may  be  here  briefly  recapitulated^    • 
-    The  Greeks,  when  we  first  meet  with  them  in  his- 
tory, are  living,  like  the  rest  of  mankind,  in  societies 
held  together  by  blood-ties,  maintained  by  religious 
rites  having  their  origin  in  these  ties.     In  so  far  as  a 
moral  personality  can  be  said  to  exist  at  all,  it  is  the 
community — the  family  or  the  tribe — and  not  tlie  in- 
dividual, who  indeed  has  no  recognized  existence  except 
as  a  member  of  the  community.     The  religion  of  this 
period  is  animism  or  ancestor-worship.     In  course  of 
time,  through  migration  and  the  union  of  famili«^6,  the 
blood-tie  gradually  gives  place  to  the  land-tiet;^as  the 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  169 

result  of  which  the  monogamic  family  begins  to  appear 
and  claim  a  certain  independence,  which  it  is  able  to 
maintain  by  private  property  in  land.  The  religion  of 
this  period  is  the  worship  of  the  powers  of  Nature — 
polytheism — which,  however,  only  gradually  and  par- 
tially replaces  ancestor-worship.  After  a  time  again, 
through  the  multiplication  of  families  and  the  appro- 
priation of  all  the  available  land  by  a  certain  number 
of  them,  leaving  the  rest  landless,  there  grows  up  a  dis- 
tinction of  classes,  a  distinction  between  gentle  and 
simple.  In  order  to  protect  their  common  interests 
against  the  others,  the  members  of  the  landed  class 
unite,  build  a  common  residence  or  stronghold  (iroAts), 
eschew  labor,  establish  a  common  worship,  and  begin 
city-life.  The  bond  in  this  case  is  neither  blood  nor 
land,  but  worth  (dpeTrj)^  and  this  is  reflected  in  the 
new  gods,  who  no  longer  represent  natural  powers,  but 
spiritual  powers.  Though  polytheism  is  not  yet  over- 
come, the  way  is  paved  for  a  spiritual  monotheism. 
To  bring  this  about  only  requires  the  growth  of  reflec- 
tion. And  this  soon  makes  its  appearance  as  the  re- 
sult of  leisure. 

Up  to  this  point  the  history  of  all  peoples  seems  to 
have  been  pretty  much  the  same.  But  now  two  differ- 
ent lines  of  development  are  possible,  and  some  peo- 
ples take  the  one,  some  the  other.  Some,  like  the 
Hebrews,  whose  reflection  is  of  an  ethical  sort,  push 
straight  forward  to  monotheism  and  develop  a  truly 
spiritual  religion.  Others,  in  whom  reflection  takes 
a  purely  intellectual  turn,  gradually  abandon  the  re- 
ligious attitude  altogether  and  tend  to  find  a  basis  for 
practical  life  in  metaphysical  ideas.  Among  these  must 
be  counted  the  Greeks.     When  reflective  thought  first 


170      EDUCATION  OF  T^E  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

begins  among  them,  it  does,  indeed,  tend  for  a  brief 
period  to  monotheism  through  a  cosmogonic,  and  later 
through  an  ethical,  interpretation  of  the  old  mytbol- 
ogy ;  *  but  this  tendency  is  soon  abandoned  and  atten- 
tion directed  to  physical  nature,  for  whose  phenomena 
an  explanation  is  demanded  in  terms  of  itself^that  is, 
of  something  physical.  But  as  reflection  proceeds,  it 
learns  that  such  an  explanation  involves  an  impossi- 
bility, and  finds  itself  gradually  forced  to  make  meta- 
physical assumptions — such  as  atoms,  ratio,  mind.  But 
these  afford  no  moral  sanction,  and  so,  when  the  gods 
are  replaced  by  impersonal  metaphysical  entities,  the 

ij   chief  bond  of  society  is  broken  and  the  individual  rnan. 

'[  is  declared  to  be  the  measure  of  all  things.  Inasmuch 
as  all  morality  has  thus  far  been  social,  and  society  has 
rested  upon  religion,  the  immediate  result  is  moral 
]  confusion,  for  which  the  Sophists  are  in  large  degree 
I  responsible.  Deplorable  as  this  confusion  may  seem^ 
when  looked  at  from  without,  it  is  nevertheless  only 
the  first  crude  expression  of  man's  earliest  attempt  at 
self-determination,  and  as  such  must  be  judged  leni- 
ently. In  fact,  if  we  consider  carefully  and  judge 
calmly,  we  shall  have  to  admit  that  the  Protagorean 
substitution  of  man  for  God  as  the  universal  deter- 
miner is  the  germ  of  that  ferment  which  has  res«lted 
in  the  new  wine  of  moral  freedom.  Man  had  to  break 
away  from  the  old  gods,  whose  rule  annulled  human 
freedom,  and  find  new  gods,  or,  more  truly,  a  new  God, 
whose  rule  was  compatible  with  it.     The  latter  was  the 

*  The  former  we  find  in  the  so-called  Orphic  poetry  and  in 
the  fragments  of  Pherecydes  (which  may  contain  Semitic  ele- 
ments), the  latter  in  the  plays  of  ^schylus. 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  171 

task  which  Socrates  set  himself,  and  which,  indeed,  he 
accomplished,  by  discovering  in  man  a  universal  divine 
element,  which  indeed  is  the  measure  of  all  things. 
This  was  the  greatest  discovery  ever  made  by  any  hu- 1 
man  being,  and  the  one  that  renders  possible  moral 
life,  whether  individual,  social,  or  political.    But  there 
still  remained  the  question :  How  shall  this  discovery 
be  made  the  principle  of  social  life  ?    To  the  task  of 
answering  this,  first  Plato  and  then  Aristotle  addressed 
themselves.     But  the  former  misstated  the  question  in 
asking  it,  and  then  allowed  his  judgment  to  be  warped 
by  personal    and    class  prejudices,  while   the   latter, 
though  he  put  the  question  correctly,  lacked  a  clear 
consciousness  of  that  divine  element  which  alone  could 
have  enabled  him  to  give  the  correct  answer.     Thus 
both  equally  failed  to  discover  the  concrete  social  em- 
bodiment of  moral  freedom,  leaving  to  the  world  only 
cunningly  constructed  schemes  incapable  of  realiza- 
tion.    This  was  the  condition  of  things  when  Aris- 
totle died,  and  the  education  of  Greece  as  a  nation, 
came  to  a  close.     The  task  of  the  Greek  people  had 
not  been  accomplished ;   but  it  had  risen  into  clear 
consciousness  and  become  an  object  of  serious  effort,      i 
As  might  have  been  expected,  a  problem  originally  -^ 
set  by  actual  life  was  solved,  not  in  the  field  of  specula- 
tion, but  in  that  of  practice,  under  the  pressure  of  so-V 
cial  and  individual  needs.    What  Aristotle  failed  to  do 
his  pupil  Alexander  went  far  to  accomplish.    By  break- 
ing down  and  absorbing  in  his  empire  the  little  Greek 
states  in  which  the  individual  had  previously  found 
his  spiritual  solidarity  or  sphere  of  ethical  action,  he 
compelled  him  to  look  for  this  solidarity  elsewhere. 
The  immediate  result  was  the  formation   of  private 


f- 


172      EDUCATION  OF  XHE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

j  societies,  or  philosophic  schools,  whose  members  were 
^  bound  together  by  a  common  system  of  truth,  in  ac- 
cordance with  which  they  sought  to  shape  their  indi- 
vidual lives.   These  societies  were  entirely  disconnected 
Avith  the  state  and  admitted  to  their  membership  per- 
/sons  of  all  nations,  tongues,  and  classes.     Here,  there- 
( fore,  for  the  first  time  in  history  we  find  men  united 
■  by  the  universal  divine  element  in  them,  and,  under 
the  influence  of  this,  setting  at  naught  all  other  bonds, 
whether  of  family,  race,  or  religion.    Here  for  the  first 
time  we  find  cosmopolitanism  and  a  sense  of  the  spir- 
itual solidarity  of  humanity. 

I  am  strongly  of  the  belief  that  the  part  played  by 
the  Greek  philosophic  schools  in  cherishing  this  sense, 
}  and  so  paving  the  way  for  a  universal  moral  institu- 
'  tion,  has  never  been  sufficiently  recognized.  Still  it 
was  not  in  the  schools  founded  by  Plato  and  Aristotle 
that  this  work  was  most  effectively  done,  but  in  two 
others  that  arose  soon  after  the  death  of  the  latter — 
the  Stoic  and  the  Epicurean,  and  especially  in  the 
\  former.  The  brilliant  intellectual  results  attained  by 
Plato  and  Aristotle  have  in  great  measure  blinded  us 
to  the  far  more  important  moral  results  accomplished 
by  the  schools  of  Zeno  and  Epicurus.  Moreover,  the 
work  of  these  latter  was  in  time  completely  thrown 
into  shadow  by  the  far  more  splendid  work  of  the 
"  divine  man  "  of  Xazareth,  while  that  of  the  other 
two  remained  without  a  peer.  In  spite  of  this,  if  we 
would  understand  the  last  stages  in  the  process  by 
which  the  task  of  the  Greeks  was  accomplished  and 
moral  liberty  made  the  principle  of  human  life,  we 
must  consider  and  try  to  understand  the  work  done 
by  the  Stoics  and  Epicureans.     In  this  connection  it 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  173 

is,  of  course,  their  practical  tenets  rather  th^  theif 
metaphysical  principles  that  interest  us ;  but,  inasmuch 
as  the  former  necessarily  depend  in  some  degree  on  the 
latter,  we  must  cast  a  glimpse  at  these  also. 

Wide  as  the  two  systems  in  question  stand  apart, 
their  fundamental  positions  differ  only  in  this  respect, 
that  the  one  is  founded  upon  intellect  and  the  other 
upon  sense.  This,  indeed,  is  a  wide  enough  difference, 
and  all  their  separate  peculiarities  follow  from  it.  Both 
are  equally  materialistic ;  but  while  Stoicism,  drawing 
upon  the  thought  of  Heraclitus,  holds  matter  to  be  a 
conti7i?ium,  moved  and  governed  by  an  inherent,  all- 
pervading  reason  (Xoyo?),  Epicureanism,  inspired  by 
Democritus,  regards  it  as  composed  of  atoms  individu- 
ally moved  by  a  blind  impulse.  Both  subordinate  the  / 
theoretical  to  the  practical,  and  tend  to  take  the  place/ 
of  religion.  From  the  monism  of  Stoicism  there  fo^ 
low  two    conclusions    bearing   closely  upon   ethics- 

(1)  that  the  universe  is  governed  by  necessity  or  fate, 

(2)  that  man  is  an  integral  part  of  the  universe  so 
governed,  and  therefore  has  no  free  will.  Thus,  under 
the  influence  of  materialism,  the  Socratic  doctrine  that 
men  are  one  through  a  common  divine,  freeing  ele- 
ment in  them  turns  over  into  the  doctrine  that  the 
divine  alone  has  any  real  existence,  and  that  men  are 
mere  temporary  manifestations  of  it.  It  may  seem 
strange  that,  with  a  belief  like  this,  there  should  be 
room  in  Stoicism  for  any  ethical  system  at  all ;  but 
the  fact  is,  it  comprises  a  higher  and  more  complete 
ethical  system  than  ever  had  been  known  before.  To 
Stoicism  we  owe  the  conception  and  first  name  of  duty 
(KaOiJKov),  the  nQticux^gf^-corgplpte  peyseeftl-indepeiid- 
ence,  and  the  ideal  of  universal  brotherhood,  three  of 


174      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

the  chief  forces  that  have  shaped,  and  are  shaping, 
modern  civilization.  No  doubt,  its  notions  of  duty 
and  personal  independence  were  exaggerated  and  at 
bottom  false ;  but  their  very  exaggeration  did  much 
to  impress  them  for  all  time  upon  the  world.  We  can 
easily  forgive  the  rigorous  discipline  by  which  the 
Stoic  strove  to  make  himself  the  organ  of  the  uni- 
versal Logos,  in  defiance  of  all  the  demands  of  sense, 
as  well  as  his  self-sufficiency  when  he  thought  he  had 
succeeded,  when  wo  remember  that  the  same  panthe- 
istic doctrine  which  resulted  in  these  also  took  the 
form  of  a  vigorous  universal  human  sympathy  such 
as  we  should  vainly  look  for  in  pre- Stoic  times.*  If 
theoretically  the  Stoics  were  governed  by  reason,  in 
their  practical  relations  with  men  they  were  governed 
by  sympathy,  which  is  the  first  step  toward  love. 

Of  all  the  philosophic  systems  of  the  ancient  world 
Stoicism  was,  morally  speaking,  the  highest  and  pro- 
duced the  noblest  men — Marcus  Aurelius,  Epictetus, 
Seneca,  etc. — and  nothing  prevented  it  from  being  the 
true  and  ultimate  concrete  form  of  moral  life  but  its 
metaphysical  basis,  its  materialism,  fatalism,  and  prac- 
tical atheism.  As  a  system  of  ethics  divorced  from 
religion,  it  is  unsurpassed  and  unsurpassable ;  but  as 
a  solution  of  the  problem  of  moral  life  in  the  deepest 
sense,  in  the  sense  of  a  free  life  in  a  world  of  free  per- 
sonalities, it  is  necessarily  a  failure. 

We  can  afford  to  pass  by  Epicureanism  with  very 
slight  notice  for  two  reasons — (1)  because  it  added  no 

*  There  is,  indeed,  a  dawning  of  it  in  the  ^schylean  Pro- 
metheus, who  in  very  many  respects  was  a  Stoic  before  Stoicism. 
The  word  "  philanthropic  "  {^iXdvepuvos)  occurs  first  in  the  Prom., 
lines  11,  28. 


THE  SCIENTIFIC  STATE.  175 

new  element  to  Greek  education,  and  (2)  because,  not-  p 
withstanding  its  long  history  of  six  hundred  years,  it 
contributed  no  element  to  cosmopolitan  life.  It  is 
essentially  materialistic,  sensual,  hedonistic,  and  ^ath^J 
istic,  and  is  rather  a_system  of  ethical  despair  than  of 
ethics.  Curiously  enough,  in  strong  contrast  to  Stoi- 
cism, it  champions  and  emphasizes  the  freedom  of 
the  will.  The  bond  of  union  among  Epicureans  was 
friendship,  the  most  subjective  of  all  relations,  as 
Erdmann  says.  In  adopting  this  they  returned  to 
Aristotelianism  and  fell  short  of  the  Stoic  universal 
sympathy. 

Four  distinguished  men  undertook  to  solve  the 
problem  propounded  by  Socrates :  How  can  the  uni- 
versal divine  principle  in  man  be  made  the  basis  of  a 
concrete  social  moral  life? — two  of  them,  Plato  and 
Aristotle,  theoretically,  and  two,  Zeno  and  Epicurus, 
practically.  All  failed,  each  for  a  different  reason. 
With  their  attempts  were  exhausted  the  possibilities 
of  solution  with  the  resources  of  Greek  thought  and 
life  alone.  Just  as  all  attempts  to  found  a  united 
Greek  empire  by  means  of  internal  forces  failed,  and 
success  was  reserved  for  a  foreign  conqueror,  so  all  at- 
tempts to  solve  the  problem  which  the  unfolding  of 
Greek  life  and  thought  propounded  failed  as  long  as 
only  internal  resources  alone  were  drawn  upon.  Greece 
had  to  go  beyond  herself  to  solve  her  own  riddle. 

We,  looking  back  from  a  distance  of  two  thousand 
years,  can  easily  see  where  the  difficulty  lay,  and  can 
not  but  wonder  that  a  solution  which  looks  as  if  it 
must  have  lain  before  the  feet  of  everybody  should 
have  been  obstinately  disregarded.  But  our  wonder 
will  cease  when  we  remember  how  persistent  and  how 
13 


176      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

blinding  are  philosophical  prepossessions,  especially 
when  they  have  passed  through  a  number  of  phases. 
Just  as  the  Lockean  dogma  that  all  knowledge  comes 
through  the  five  senses  has,  in  one  form  or  another, 
become  a  blinding  prepossession  of  modern  thought, 
preventing  it  from  seeing  the  most  obvious  solutions 
of  many  vexed  problems  of  philosophy  and  practice, 
so  the  Platonic  conception  of  God  as  an  abstract  idea 
became  an  unreasoned  presupposition  of  all  subsequent 
Greek  thought,  closing  its  eyes  to  the  only  truth  which 
was  needed  for  the  solution  of  its  supreme  question. 
Before  the  Greek  mind  can  advance  further,  it  must 
absorb  a  foreign  element,  and  to  a  consideration  of 
this  we  must  next  address  ourselves. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

GREEK  EDUCATION  IK  CONTACT  WITH  THE  GREAT 
EASTERN   WORLD. 

It  is  often  said  that  a  good  teacher  learns  as  much 
from  his  pupils  as  they  do  from  him.  This  was  exem- 
plified in  the  case  of  the  Greeks  when  they  became 
masters  of  the  East  and  undertook  to  impart  their 
culture  to  it.  While  Greece  in  her  little  polities  was 
working  out  her  new  civilization,  she  had  suffered 
grievously  at  the  hands  of  the  older  civilizations  of 
the  East.  When  at  last,  united  by  a  foreign  conqueror 
and  made  a  province  of  his  empire,  she  was  placed  in 
a  commanding  position  with  respect  to  the  other  prov- 
inces, she  began  the  spiritual  conquest  of 'her  old  foe — 
the  Hellenization  of  the  East.  It  is-  true  that,  long 
before  the  advent  of  Alexander,  there  had  been  a  very 
extensive  Greek  Diaspora^  carrying  Greek  ideas  and 
practices  into  many  parts  of  the  East ;  but,  like  the 
Jewish  Diaspora^  it  had  earned  little  respect  and  ex- 
erted comparatively  little  influence.  It  was  only  when 
Greeks  and  their  culture  were  placed  in  a  position  where 
they  could  not  be  disregarded  or  contemned  that  they 
began  to  exercise  an  all-transforming  influence.  Then, 
however,  the  process  went  on  rapidly.  Within  a  cen- 
tury after  Alexander's  death  the  whole  of  the  then 
known  East  was  saturated  with  Greek  ideas  and  habits. 


178       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

Even  the  conservative  Palestinian  Jews  were  so  deeply 
affected  by  them  that  even  the  great  and  glorious  Mac- 
cabaean  reaction  in  favor  of  pure  Jehovistic  religion 
and  theocracy  did  not  suffice  to  eradicate  them,  com- 
pletely.* 

At  first,  of  course,  the  results  of  Greek  teaching 
showed  themselves  in  externals — in  the  establishment 
of  Greek  schools,  palaestras,  gymnasia,  theatres,  and 
stadia ;  but  it  was  not  long  before  the  deeper  elements 
of  Greek  culture — art  and  philosophy,  especially  the 
latter — began  to  find  a  fruitful  soil  among  the  "  bar- 
barians." Indeed,  it  is  a  remarkable  and  somewhat 
inexplicable  fact  that  nearly  all  the  great  names  in 
Greek  philosophy  after  the  death  of  Aj-istotle  are 
names  not  of  Greeks,-  but  of  Orientals.  Even  the 
founder  of  Stoicism,  Zeno,  seems  to  have  been  a  Phoe- 
nician, or  perhaps  a  Hittite.  But,  however  much  the 
Orientals  might  wish  to  adopt  the  victorious  and  fash- 
ionable Hellenism,  they  came  to  Greek  thought  with 
Oriental  temperaments  and  Oriental  prepossessions. 
While,  therefore,  the  philosophy  which  they  professed 
might  call  itself  Greek,  and  in  its  outward  form  really 
was  so,  it  contained  inner  or  material  elements  which 
were  not  Greek,  and  which  deeply  affected  even  those 
which  were.  ^ 

These  elements  were,  on  the  whole,  of  a  religious 
sort,  so  that  from  the  time  when  Greek  thought  came 
i  in  contact  with  the  East  it  began  to  be  religious.  Nat- 
urally it  was  only  religious  conceptions  of  a  high  order, 
such  as  were  capable  of  philosophic  expression,  that 

*  This  influence  may  be  traced  in  Ecclesiastes,  and  is  prom- 
inent in  the  Apocrypha.  See  Schiirer,  History  of  the  Jews  in 
the  Time  of  Christ,  pas&im. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.   179 

were  able  to  coalesce  with  Greek  thought.  Among 
such  conceptions  there  were  four  that  specially  char- 
acterized the  higher  religions  of  the  East:  (1)  that  of 
the  personality  and  transcendence  of  God ;  (2)  that  of 
inferior  divinities,  standing  in  the  relation  of  ministers 
to  the  supreme  God ;  (3)  that  of  a  past  revelation  of 
the  divine  will  to  or  in  man  through  these  ministers ; 
(4)  that  of  a  future  revealer.  These  conceptions  are 
common  to  the  two  higher  Oriental  religions  with 
which  we  are  best  acquainted,  and  whose  canonical 
literature,  in  part  at  least,  remains  to  us — Zoroastrian- 
ism  and  Judaism. 

In  Zoroastrianism  we  find  a  god  who,  if  not  actu- 
ally supreme,  is  at  least  potentially  so,  since  his  ulti- 
mate victory  is  assured — Ahura  Mazda,  the  personal 
and  transcendent  "creator  of  earth,  water,  trees, 
mountains,  roads,  wind,  sleep,  and  light,"  and  "  father 
of  the  six  Amesha  Spentas,  the  father  of  all  gods."  * 
Subordinate  to  him  are  a  large  number  of  divine  be- 
ings, the  highest  of  whom  are  the  Amesha  Spentas, 
originally  abstract  attributes  of  the  supreme  deity, 
afterward  hypostasized  into  angelic  personalities.! 
Through  these  beings  Ahura  Mazda  communicates 
his  will  to  man  either  by  inspiration  or  by  incarna- 
tion. The  oldest  documents  of  the  Zoroastrian  re- 
ligion, the  Gathas,  are  full  of  supplications  for  divine 
inspiration, J;  and  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  Zoro- 

*  Darmesteter,  translation  of  the  Zend-Avesta,  Introduction, 
p.  Ixi. 

f  Ihid.,  p.  lix  sqq.  Mills'  translation  of  the  Zend-Avesta, 
Introduction,  p.  xxiv;  cf.  Cheyne,  The  Origin  and  Religious 
Contents  of  the  Psalter,  p.  334. 

X  "  The  wonderful  idea  that  God's  attributes  are  his  messen- 


180      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

aster  himself  was  regarded  as  the  incarnation  of  a 
divine  spirit.  *  Lastly,  Zoroastrianism  looks  forward 
to  a  Savior,  Saoshyant,  who  will  spring  from  the  seed 
of  Zoroaster,  and  who,  by  finally  overcoming  Angro 
Mainyus,  will  introduce  the  eternal  age  of  bliss. f 

If  we  turn  to  Judaism,  we  find  essentially  the  same 
fundamental  conceptions,  with  merely  Semitic  and 
national  limitations.  At  the  summit  of  existence  is 
one  God,  the  creator  of  heaven  and  earth.  Subordi- 
nate to  him  are  the  angels,  otherwise  called  sons  of 
God,}  holy  ones,*  etc.  That  these  were  originally  mere 
attributes  or  aspects  of  God,  gradually  distinguished 
from  him  and  personified,  is  clear  enough  from  many 
passages  of  the  Hebrew  Scriptures,!  and  was  observed 
by  Philo.^    Through  these  God  communicates  his  will 

gers  sent  out  into  the  human  soul  to  ennoble  and  redeem  makes 
him  (Zoroaster)  at  times  so  subtle  that  the  latest  scholars  can 
not  tell  whether  he  means  Asha  and  Vohu  Manah  personified  as 
archangels,  or  as  the  thoughts  and  beneficent  intentions  of  the 
Deity  reproduced  in  man." — Mills'  Zend-Avesta,  Introduction, 
p.  xxiv. 

*  "  All  the  features  in  Zarathustra  point  to  a  god." — Darme- 
steter,  Introduction  to  Zend-Avesta,  p.  Ixxix ;  cf .  Farvarden  Yast, 
cap.  xxiv. 

f  "  A  maid  bathing  in  the  Lake  Kasava  will  conceive  by  it 
(the  seed  of  Zoroaster),  and  bring  forth  the  victorious  Saoshyant, 
who  will  come  from  the  region  of  the  dawn,  to  free  the  world 
from  death  and  decay,  from  corruption  and  rottenness,  ever  liv- 
ing and  ever  thriving,  when  the  dead  shall  arise  and  immortality 
commence." — Darmesteter,  ut  sup.     Cf.  Zamydd  Yast,  cap.  xv. 

}  Job,  ii,  1 ;  xxxviii,  7 ;  Psalms,  xxix,  1 ;  Ixxxix,  7 ;  Dan.  iii, 
25,  etc. 

*  Job,  V,  1 ;  XV,  15 ;  Psalms,  Ixxxix,  6,  7. 

I  Gen.  i,  26;  xviii,  1-3;  xxxii,  24-31 ;  Job,  ii,  1,  etc. 

^  See  Drummond,  Philo  Judcpus,  vol.  ii,  book  iii,  chap.  v. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.  181 

to  men,  and,  indeed,  governs  the  world.*  And,  lastly, 
the  Jewish  belief  in  a  coming  Messiah  is  too  well 
known  to  require  more  than  a  passing  remark. 

Such,  then,  were  the  four  leading  characteristics  of 
the  two  great  and  widely  spread  religions  with  which 
Greek  thought  came  in  close  contact  after  the  conquest 
of  Alexander.  While  it  might,  and,  on  the  whole, 
did,  ignore  such  inferior  religions  as  the  Babylonian, 
Egyptian,  and  Phoenician,  it  could  not  disregard  these 
or  remain  unaffected  by  them,  especially  as  in  some  of 
their  characteristics  they  supplied  its  most  marked 
deficiencies,  and  gave  life  and  concreteness  to  some  of 
its  dead,  abstract  conceptions.  To  the  Greek,  God  was 
an  abstraction — the  Good,  Intelligence,  or  the  like ; 
his  agents,  whereby  he  acted  upon  the  world,  were 
numbers,  ratios,  or  ideas ;  the  revelation  of  him  was  a 
mere  intellectual  vision  of  these ;  what  hope  there  was 
of  anything  better  in  the  future  was  confined  to  a  wish 
and  a  vague  hope  that  a  "  divine  man  "  f  might  some 
day  appear.  To  the  Persian  and  the  Jew,  on  the  con- 
trary, God  was  a  living,  holy,  all-knowing,  all-powerful 
personality,  searching  the  hearts  and  trying  the  reins 
of  every  human  being,  in  whose  sight  the  heavens  were 
not  clean,  and  who  charged  his  angels  with  folly ;  his 
agents  were  living  persons — his  sons,  holy  ones — do- 
ing his  holy  will  with  obedient  might ;  the  revelation 

*  See  the  argument  in  the  first  chapter  of  the  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews^  and  compare  Everling,  Die  paulinische  Angelologie 
und  JDcemonologie,  passim. 

f  See  ^schylus,  Prom.  Vinct.,  844  sqq. ;  Aristotle,  Politics, 
iii,  13 ;  1384a  3  sqq. ;  Eth.  Nic,  vii,  1 ;  1145a  15  sqq. ;  Plato,  Phcedo, 
85  D.  (where  a  "  Divine  Word,"  deios  hSyos,  is  looked  forward  to 
as  a  possibility). 


182      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

of  him  was  a  manifestation  of  that  holy  will  to  chosen 
lawgivers  (Moses,  Zoroaster),  in  the  form  of  a  law  de- 
termining conduct,  and  promising  the  favor  of  Him  in 
whose  hands  are  life  and  death  ;  the  hope  of  the  future 
centered  upon  the  certain  appearance  of  a  great  divine 
person,  who  should  put  an  end  to  evil,  consign  its 
agents  to  everlasting  darkness,  and  usher  in  for  the 
good  an  eternity  of  holiness  and  happiness,  in  the  pres- 
ence and  service  of  the  Lord  of  the  Universe. 

That  Greek  thinkers  should  remain  indifferent  to 
such  conceptions  as  these,  or  that  Orientals,  on  becom- 
ing acquainted  with  Greek  philosophy,  should  abandon 
them,  would  have  been  strange  indeed.  On  the  one 
hand,  they  were  just  what  that  philosophy  needed  in 
order  to  give  its  principles  life,  reality,  and  motive 
power ;  and,  on  the  other,  philosophy  was  what  they 
needed  in  order  to  give  them  a  universal  and  rational 
expression.  We  need  not  be  surprised,  therefore,  to 
find  that,  under  the  rule  of  Alexander's  successors, 
Greek  philosophy  begins  to  borrow  theological  beliefs 
from  Zoroastrianism  and  Judaism,  while  these  religions 
begin  to  express  their  beliefs  in  philosophic  form.  The 
former  tendency  shows  itself  in  all  the  schools  of  Greek 
thought  soon  after  they  are  transplanted  to  Alexandria ; 
the  latter,  in  the  rise  of  Perso-Hellenic  and  Judaeo- 
Hellenic  religious  philosophies,  based  upon  sacred  writ- 
ings. After  a  time  the  results  of  these  two  tendencies 
united,  thenceforth  to  flow  on  in  a  single  stream. 

The  truth  is,  in  the  process  whereby  Hellenic  genius 
continued  its  mission  through  union  with  Orientalism 
we  must  distinguish  two  stages.  In  the  former  of 
these,  while  Hellenism  borrows  from  Orientalism,  and 
Orientalism  from  Hellenism,  each  maintains  a  distinct 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.   183 

existence  and  stands  consciously  opposed  to  the  other, 
Hellenism  being  prevailingly  philosophic  and  natural- 
istic, Orientalism  prevailingly  religious  and  spiritual- 
istic. In  the  latter,  the  opposition  between  the  two 
ceases ;  philosophy  and  religion,  nature  and  spirit,  are 
co-ordinated.  The  abstract  ideas  and  relations  of  phi- 
losophy are  identified  with  the  gods  and  angels  of  re- 
ligion ;  the  process  of  the  world  becomes  the  expression 
of  the  divine  reason  (Aoybs).  It  is  only  in  this  second 
stage  that  Greek  thought  really  finds  its  completion. 

Since  the  days  of  the  Renaissance  it  has  been  usual 
to  regard  this  union  of  Hellenism  and  Orientalism  as 
a  corruption  and  a  degradation,  as  a  mingling  of  clear 
thought  with  superstition,  as  the  end  of  science  and 
the  source  of  delusion.  The  larger  historic  outlook  of 
the  present  day  is  teaching  us  to  draw  a  very  different 
conclusion,  and  to  see  in  the  four  world-transform- 
ing results  of  this  union — Christianity,  Neoplatonism, 
Manicha3ism,  and  Mohammedanism — a  growth  and  a 
consummation.  The  strongest  of  the  four  is  that  in 
which  the  union  is  most  complete. 

It  is  not  easy,  for  want  of  documents,  to  follow  the 
process  of  the  gradual  infiltration  of  Oriental  concep- 
tions into  Greek  philosophy,  and  Zeller  has  done  his 
best  to  ignore  their  influence.  Nevertheless,  the  re- 
sults that  ultimately  followed  in  the  forms  of  Neo- 
pythagoreanism  and  Neoplatonism  leave  no  doubt  that 
it  was  real  and  pervasive.  Epicureanism,  as  being 
least  of  a  philosophy  and  hostile  to  religion,  was  but 
little  affected;  but  Platonism,  Aristotelianism,  and 
Stoicism  underwent  considerable  changes,  which  had 
the  effect  of  partially  obliterating  their  differences  and 
bringing  them  together.     And  there  was  a  fifth  phi- 


184:       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GUEEK  PEOPLE. 

losophy,  which,  after  having  long  smoldered  in  ob- 
scurity, now  came  again  to  the  surface,  and  proved 
more  able  and  ready  than  all  the  rest  to  marry  with 
Orientalism.  This  was  Pythagoreanism.  This  re- 
markable and  still  imperfectly  understood  system  had, 
on  account  of  its  social  and  antipolitical — wo  might 
almost  say,  its  ecclesiastical — tendencies,  been  sup- 
pressed in  its  institutional  form  in  the  region  of  its 
birth.  Magna  Orascia,  in  th6  fifth  century  b.  c.  In 
spite  of  this  its  principles  had  lived  on,  cherished  by  a 
few  select  and  strongly  religious  spirits,  and  from  time 
to  time  making  its  presence  felt  in  other  systems,  nota- 
bly in  that  of  Plato.  Now,  at  last,  when  the  small 
Greek  states,  which  had  found  its  inlluence  disorgan- 
izing, were  placed  in  a  position  of  subordination  to  a 
higher  power,  which  could  permit  freedom  of  thought 
and  freedom  of  organization,  it  came  forth  from  its 
concealment  and  claimed  a  leading  place  in  the  world 
of  thought,  a  place  which  it  soon  conquered  for  itself.* 
Though  each  of  these  philosophies  long  maintjiined 
a  separate  existence  and  a  separate  school,  yet,  tlianks 
partly  to  the  new  political  conditions,  partly  to  the 
influence  of  Oriental  religions,  there  were  many  im- 
portant points  and  tcndencnes  in  which  the  four  last- 
named  agreed.  To  the  former  cause  were  due  the 
separation  of  ethics  from  politics,  the  tendency  to  cos- 
mopolitanism or  humanitarianism,  and  the  effect  of 
men  to  withdraw  from  the  business  and  interests  of 
the  world  and  to  find  their  happiness  in  states  of  their 


♦  The  history  of  Pythap^oroanism  has  still  to  bo  written. 
IWth's  accoiuit  is  inicritical,  Zciler's  hypercriticul  and  tenden- 
tious. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  TQB  EASTEKN  WORLD.  185 

own  consciousness,  in  some  form  of  restful  self-pos- 
session. To  the  latter  were  due  the  connection  of 
ethics  with  theology  or  religion,  the  separation  of  re- 
ligion from  statecraft,  and  the  extreme  importance 
assigned  to  it.  All  these  common  characteristics  might 
be  summed  up  in  one — a  tendency  to  religious,  as  dis- 
tinct from  political,  life.  This,  indeed,  is  the  common 
mark  of  all  post-Aristotelii^n  thought.  But,  although 
philosophy  thus  became  religious,  and  did  so  largely 
under  Oriental  influence,  it  was  long  before  it  adopted 
any  one  of  the  four  leading  tenets  that  marked  the 
higher  religions  of  the  East.  What  Orientalism  at 
first  did  for  Greek  thought  was  not  to  impart  to  it 
new  tenets,  but  to  give  it  a  new  direction,  and  a  new, 
a  religious  consecration.     Later  it  was  otherwise. 

It  need  hardly  be  said  that  it  was  Zoroastrianism, 
and  not  Judaism,  that  affected  Greek  thought  in  the 
age  immediately  succeeding  Aristotle.  There  is  no 
sufficient  proof  that  Aristotle  knew  anything  of  the 
Jewish  faith,  whereas  the  religion  of  Zoroaster  was 
known  to  the  Greeks  long  before,  probably  as  early  as 
the  time  of  Pythagoras.  Democritus  is  said  to  have 
visited  Persia,  and  Herodotus,  though  he  does  not 
mention  Zoroaster,  refers  to  many  traits  of  his  religion 
(i,  131-140).  Plato  mentions  him  by  name,  and  calls 
him  the  son  of  Ahura  Mazda  ('Opo/Aa^ry?).*  Aristotle 
is  said  to  have  written  a  book  on  Magianism  (MaytKos), 

*  Alcibiad.,  i,  122  A.  The  authenticity  of  this  dialogue  is 
doubtful.  See  Zeller,  Philos.  der  Griech.,  ii,  418,  and  cf.  Her- 
mann, Ofisch.  und  System  der  plat.  Philos.,  p.  439  5^7.  Clem- 
ens Alexandrinus  (StroiH.,  v.  p.  711)  identifies  Er,  the  Pamphyl- 
ian,  whoso  wonderful  story  is  told  in  the  tenth  book  of  the 
liejjublic,  with  Zoroaster ! 


186       EDUCATION  OP, THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

and,  though  this  is  doubtful,  it  is  certain  that  he  was 
acquainted  with  Magian  thought,*  and  considered  the 
Magian  religion  older  than  the  Egyptian. f  From  this 
time  on  the  Magian  system  seems  to  have  been  quite 
familiar  to  the  Greek  world. J  Indeed,  one  element 
of  it — viz.,  Magian  divination — seems  to  have  been 
familiar  to  it  much  earlier.  Aristotle  is  quoted  as 
authority  for  the  statement  that  a  Magian  from  Syria 
prophesied  to  Socrates  the  whole  course  of  his  life  and 
his  violent  death.*  Be  this  as  it  may,  there  seems  lit- 
tle doubt  that  certain  leading  characteristics  of  Hel- 
lenistic philosophic  religion,  its  mysticism,  its  theurgy, 
its  divination,  etc.,  were  largely  due  to  Zoroastrian  in- 
fluence. It  is  well  known  that  about  the  Christian  era 
the  worship  of  Mithras  prevailed  nearly  all  over  the 
Roman  Empire,  and  that  it  was  for  centuries  a  power- 
ful rival  to  Christianity,  which  apparently  borrowed 
some  features  from  it.|| 

With  regard  to  the  influence  of  Judaism  upon 
Greek  philosophy  we  are  better  informed.  This  in- 
fluence must  have  begun  about  the  middle  of  the  third 
century  B.  c,  when  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  were  trans- 
lated into  Greek.    It  soon  grew  so  powerful  that  many 

*  Metaph.,  iv,  4,  1091b,  10.  Here  we  are  told  that  "  the 
Magians  consider  the  first  begetter  (creator?)  the  Supreme 
Being." 

f  Dialogue  Tlepl  ^iKo<To<pias,  frag.  8.  He  adds,  "  And  accord- 
ing to  them  (the  Magi)  there  are  two  first  principles — a  good 
power  and  an  evil  power  {^alymv),  the  name  of  the  former 
being  Zeus  and  Oromasdes,  that  of  the  latter  Hades  and  Arei- 
manios. 

X  See  Windischmann,  Zoroastrische  Studien,  pp.  260-313. 

•  Diog.  Laert.,  Life  of  Socrates,  xxiv,  45. 

\  See  Harnack,  Dogmengeschichte,  vol.  i,  pp.  105,  395. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.  187 

Greeks  became  proselytes  to  Judaism  and  many  more 
sincere  admirers  of  its  principles.  It  formed  a  power- 
ful element  in  Neopythagoreanism,  and  greatly  helped 
to  encourage  a  belief  in  prophesy  and  direct  divine 
revelations.* 

When  we  come  to  consider  the  effect  of  Hellenic 
thought  on  the  two  great  religions  of  the  East — Zoro- 
astrianism  and  Judaism — we  have  to  confess  that  our 
knowledge  of  its  effect  on  the  former  is  very  meagre 
indeed.  The  reason  of  this  is  that  Zoroastrianism 
practically  disappeared  from  the  world  twelve  hundred 
years  ago,  and  that  the  records  of  its  attempts  to  find 
an  expression  in  philosophy  mostly  perished  with  it. 
But  that  the  Zoroastrians  tried  to  combine  their  re- 
ligion with  Greek  thought  there  can  be  no  doubt;  and 
some  of  the  results  of  this  combination  were  far-reach- 
ing indeed,  contributing  elements  to  Neoplatonism, 
Christian  Gnosticism,  Manichaeism,  Mohammedanism, 
and  Mysticism.  That  the  Magians  had  a  sort  of  philo- 
sophic theology  even  before  they  became  acquainted 
with  the  Greeks  seems  clear  from  the  statement  of 
Aristotle  quoted  on  p.  186,  as  well  as  from  the  esteem 
which  their  sages  generally  enjoyed.  Indeed,  even  the 
most  ancient  form  pf  Zoroastrianism  with  which  we 
are  acquainted,  that  which  appears  in  the  Gathas,  is 
already  a  philosophy  of  a  high  order,  albeit  it  is  not 
expressed  in  strictly  philosophical  language.  But 
shortly  after  the  time  of  Alexander,  who,  it  may  be 
remarked,  is  said  to  have  destroyed  a  large  portion 
of  the  sacred  books  of  the  Zoroastrians,  a  distinct 
change  takes  place  in  the  Persian  religion,  what  we 

*  See  Zeller,  Philos.  der  Griechen,  v,  62  sq.  (2d  edit.). 


188      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

might  call  a  tendency  to  rationalism.  Whereas  in  the 
Gathas,  which,  I  believe,  are  the  only  part  of  the  Zend- 
Avesta  that  fairly  represent  the  religion  of  the  Magi 
before  Alexander,  the  supreme  powers  are  the  strongly 
personal  Ahura  Mazda  and  Angro  Mainyus,  in  the 
later  parts  of  that  work  we  find  the  beginning  of  a 
tendency  to  personify  certain  abstractions  and  elevate 
them  to  the  highest  place,  a  tendency  which  afterward 
became  very  pronounced.  "  When  the  Magi  had  ac- 
counted for  the  existence  of  evil  by  the  existence  of 
two  principles,  there  arose  the  question  how  there 
could  be  two  principles,  and  a  longing  for  unity  was 
felt,  which  found  its  satisfaction  in  the  assumption 
that  both  are  derived  from  one  and  the  same  princi- 
ple. This  principle  was,  according  to  divers  sects, 
either  Space,  or  Infinite  Light,  or  Boundless  Time,  or 
Fate.  Of  most  of  these  systems  no  direct  trace  is 
found  in  the  Avesta,  yet  they  existed  already  in  the 
time  of  Aristotle."  *  Spiegel,  in  his  Erdnisclie  Alter- 
thumskunde  (vol.  ii,  pp.  4-19),  treats  these  and  several 
other  principles  as  "  extramundane  deities,"  admitting 
that  they  are  not  prominent  in  the  Zend-Avesta  ;  but 
the  truth  is  they  bear  the  same  relation  to  the  true 
divinities  of  Zoroastrianism  that  the  abstract  principles 
of  the  Greek  philosophers — number,  ratio,  love,  hate, 

*  Darmesteter,  Zend-Avesta,  Introd.,  p.  Ixxxii.  In  a  note 
reference  is  made  to  a  passage  from  Eudemus,  the  pupil  of 
Aristotle,  in  which  he  says :  "  As  to  the  Magi,  and  the  whole 
Arian  stock,  some  of  them  call  the  whole  Intelligible  and  Uni- 
fied Space,  others  call  it  Time,  holding  that  out  of  this  are  dis- 
tinguished a  good  God  and  an  evil  Power,  and  that  light  and 
darkness  are  prior  to  these,  as  some  maintain." — Wolf's  Anecdota 
Orceca,  vol.  iii,  p.  259. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.   189 

intellect,  being,  necessity,  etc. — bear  to  the  gods  of 
Greece.  How  far  they  are  due  to  Greek  influence  is 
at'present  uncertain ;  but  to  some  extent  they  certainly 
are  so. 

In  dealing  with  this  question  we  must  carefully  dis- 
tinguish between  the  Zoroastrianism  of  Persia  and  that 
of  the  Persian  Diaspora*  The  former,  coming  but 
slightly  in  contact  with  Greek  influences,  was  naturally 
but  little  affected  by  them,  whereas  the  latter  seems  to 
have  been  greatly  modified.  One  of  the  most  con- 
spicuous results  of  this  modification  was  the  rise  of 
the  worship  of  Mithras,  which  in  the  Diaspora  seem 
almost  to  have  superseded  that  of  Ahura  Mazda.  In- 
deed, the  worship  of  Mithras  bore  very  much  the  same 
relation  to  Zoroastrianism  that  Christianity,  later  on, 
did  to  Judaism. 

Far  more  than  Zoroastrianism,  Judaism  was  influ- 
enced by  Greek  thought.  This  influence  is  already 
faintly  manifested  in  the  book  of  Ecclesiastes,  and  is 
unmistakable  in  the  Septuagint,  which  belongs  in  the 
main  to  the  third  century  b.  c.  It  went  on  increasing 
until  it  culminated  in  systematic  attempts  to  read  the 
whole  of  Greek  philosophy  into  the  Law  and  the 
Prophets  of  the  Old  Testament.  Of  these  attempts 
the  most  successful,  most  far-reaching,  and  best  known 
is  that  of  Philo  Judaeus  (b.  c.  20  to  A.  D.  70),  whose 
works  are  to  a  large  extent  still  extant.  This  pro- 
foundly religious  and  subtle  writer  tried  to  interpret 
the  Pentateuch  in  terms  of  the  thought  of  Plato  and 

*  There  was  a  large  Zoroastrian  population  in  Armenia,  Cap- 
padocia,  Syria,  and  other  parts  of  western  Asia.  Herodotus  (i, 
135)  says,  "The  Persians  adopt  foreign  customs  (y6fiaia)  more 
readily  than  any  other  people." 


190       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

Zeno,*  and  thereby  to  elevate  Judaism  to  the  position 
of  a  universal  religion. 

The  part  which  Philo  played  in  combining  the 
highest  form  of  Orientalism  with  Greek  thought  is  so 
important  that  we  must  devote  a  little  space  to  him. 
Until  recently  it  was  usual  to  speak  of  Philo  with  a 
sort  of  kindly  contempt,  as  merely  an  ancient  Sweden- 
borg,  as  a  dreamer  who  tried  to  persuade  himself  that 
all  Greek  philosophy  had  been  borrowed  from  Moses, 
and  might  be  found  in  his  writings  by  any  one  who 
had  acquired  the  secret  of  interpreting  them,  the  gist 
of  the  secret  being  that  they  were  allegories.  While 
there  is  truth  in  this,  it  is  not  the  whole  truth.  The 
reason  why  Philo  tried  to  combine  Greek  thought  with 
Hebrew  religion  was  that  he  had  attained  an  insight, 
such  as  no  man  before  him  had  possessed,  into  what 
was  the  deepest  need  of  his  day.  He  saw  that  an  oecu- 
menic  empire  needed  an  oecumenic  religion,  and  since 
no  such  religion  seemed  to  be  forthcoming,  he  under- 
took to  present  the  scheme  of  one.f  Like  the  pious 
Jew  he  was,  he  believed  that  his  religion,  as  having 
alone  come  from  God,  could  alone  hope  to  become 
universal.  But  as  he  could  not  help  seeing  that  it 
was  not  universal,  the  question  arose  how  it  could  be 
made  so.     His  answer  was.  By  being  thrown  into  a 

*  See  Drummond,  Philo  Judceus,  or  The  Jewish- Alexandrian 
Philosophy  in  its  Development  and  Completion,  and  cf.  Bruno 
Bauer,  Philo,  Strauss  mid  Renan  und  das  Urehristenihum 
(Berlin,  1874). 

f  Nothing  shows  more  clearly  the  essentially  religious  char- 
acter of  the  ancient  state  and  the  difficulty  of  finding  a  suitable 
religion  for  the  oecumenic  empire  than  the  claim  to  divinity  ad- 
vanced by  the  Roman  emperors. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.  191 

form  of  truth  which  is  universal.  Now,  the  only  uni- 
versal-seeming form  of  truth  with  which  he  was  ac- 
quainted was  that  eclectic  form  of  Greek  philosophy 
which  had  resulted  from  the  gradual  convergence  of 
Platonic,  Aristotelian,  and  Stoic  conceptions.  The 
conclusion  was  obvious :  Judaism,  in  order  to  become 
the  universal  religion,  must  be  expressed  in  this  eclectic 
philosophy.  A  little  consideration  showed  further  that 
this  could  be  accomplished  only  if  the  records  of  the 
Hebrew  religion  were  treated  as  allegories,  whose  true 
meaning  could  be  drawn  out  only  by  philosophical 
interpretation.  And  so  Philo  treats  them.  We  may 
blame  this  method  as  much  as  we  please — and  it  is 
a  false  method,  which  science  must  forever  disown — 
nevertheless  we  shall  be  constrained  to  admit  two 
things :  (1)  that  he  rarely  allowed  it  to  draw  him 
away  from  the  truth ;  and  (2)  that  he  succeeded  in 
outlining  a  religion  which  we  are  tempted  to  say  was 
worthy  to  be  universal.* 

If  we  ask  ourselves  why  it  did  not  become  so,  we 
shall  find  that  the  reasons  were,  in  the  main,  two : 
(1)  Philo,  with  all  his  breadth  and  spirituality,  was 
entirely  unable  to  break  down  in  his  own  mind  the 
wall  that  separated  Jew  from  Gentile,  and  made  the 
former  a  privileged  being;  (2)  with  all  his  love  and 
admiration  for  the  Jewish  Jehovah,  he  allowed  Greek 
philosophy  to  transform  this  living  God,  this  personal 
sustainer  of  moral  life,  into  a  mere  abstraction,  nay, 
the  emptiest  of  all  abstractions — Being.     Thus,  not- 

*  See,  in  the  work  of  Bruno  Bauer  above  referred  to  (p.  190, 
note),  the  chapters,  Philo  as  Guide  from  Hellenism  to  Christian- 
ity (i),  and  Philo's  Spiritual  World- Religion.     Cf.  Bigg,  The 
Christian  Platonists  of  Alexandria,  Lecture  I. 
14 


192       EDUCATION  OP,  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

withstanding  mucli  that  is  noble  in  Philo's  system, 
these  two  defects  proved  fatal  to  its  claim  to  be  the 
world- religion.  The  supplement  which  Greek  thought 
required  in  order  to  make  the  moral  principle  of  Socra- 
tes the  form  of  social  life  it  did  not  find  in  Philo.  It 
had  to  look  further. 

When  Philo  had  drawn  up  his  religious  scheme, 
there  were  in  the  Hellenic  world  three  movements, 
each  endeavoring  more  or  less  blindly  to  shape  itself 
into  the  universal  religion  which  was  felt  to  be  the 
need  of  the  time,  that  for  want  of  which  the  souls  of 
men  were  dying.  The  first  was  eclectic  Greek  philos- 
ophy, in  the  main  a  compound  of  Piatonism,  Aristo- 
telianism,  and  Stoicism,  with  certain  tendencies  bor- 
rowed from  Zoroastrianism  and  Judaism.  The  second 
was  Hellenized  Zoroastrianism,  a  system  in  which  the 
old  Mazdean  personal  powers  of  Good  and  Evil  had 
been  replaced  by  material  abstractions — Time,  Space, 
Light,  Darkness — and  whose  religious  service  consisted 
of  mysterious,  material,  theurgic  rites,  performed  chiefly 
to  Mithras,  who  was  frequently  identified  with  the  Sun.* 
The  third  was  Hellenized  Judaism,  or,  as  it  is  often 
called,  Philonism,  a  system  which,  in  attempting  to 
ingraft  the  personal  moral  God  of  Moses  and  the 
Prophets  upon  the  best  thought  of  Greece,  had  al- 
lowed that  God  to  renounce  that  which  gave  him  his 
supreme  worth — his  moral  personality — and  sink  down 
into  the  emptiest  of  metaphysical  inanities.     All  these 

*  This  curious  compound  has  never,  so  far  as  I  know,  been 
fully  investigated,  or  its  effects  upon  subsequent  thought  and 
practice  carefully  traced.  It  seems  to  me  to  have  contained 
many  Stoic  conceptions,  and  to  have  played  a  greater  part  in  the 
growth  of  Christian  thought  than  is  generally  admitted. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.   I93 

three  systems  were  aiming  at  the  same  thing,  viz., 
peace  and  rest  for  the  soul,  which,  with  the  breaking 
down  of  the  ol(i  polities,  had  lost  its  moorings  and  was 
tossed  upon  a  tempestuous,  seemingly  boundless,  shore- 
less sea.  All  three  failed  in  their  quest,  for  two  rea- 
sons: (1)  because  they  did  not  understand  wherein 
^peace  of  soul  consists,  (2)  because  they  failed  to  dis- 
cover the  essential  condition  of  such  peace.  All  three 
conceived  peace  of  soul  to  consist  of  two  elements : 

(1)  apathy  with  respect  to  the  facts  of  the  real  world, 

(2)  an  intellectual  or  material  union  with  the  supreme 
abstraction.  All  were  ascetic  and  world-renouncing 
opiates  for  euthanasia,  not  stimulants  to  life.  As 
might  have  been  expected,  eclectic  Hellenism  occu- 
pied a  middle  ground  between  the  extreme  materi- 
alism of  Hellenized  Zoroastrianism  and  the  extreme 
idealism  of  Philonism.* 

With  the  failure  of  these  movements,  it  seems  as  if 
Greek  thought  were  never  to  accomplish  its  task  of 
elevating  man  to  concrete  moral  freedom,  as  if  the 
education  of  the  Greek  people  had  been  in  vain.  But 
Pliilo  was  still  in  all  the  vigor  of  manhood,  when,  in  an 
obscure  corner  of  the  fatherland  of  his  people,  there 
arose  a  man  who,  without  any  parade  of  philosophic 

*  It  need  hardly  be  remarked  that  there  were  other  com- 
pounds of  Hellenism  and  Judaism  besides  Philonism.  What 
Philonism  was  to  the  diaspora,  Essenism  was  to  native  Juda- 
ism. Essenisra,  if  we  may  believe  two  such  scholars  as  Zel'er 
{Philosophie  der  Griechen,  vol.  v,  p.  279  sqq.)  and  Schiirer 
{Creschichte  des  jud.  Volkes),  was  a  compound  of  Judaism  and 
Pythagoreanism.  1  can  not  but  think,  with  Hilgenfeld,  that  it 
contained  Zoroastrian  elements — for  example,  a  very  pronounced 
dualism. 


194      EDUCATION  OF  ^THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

acquirement,*  gave  to  the  world  in  the  simplest,  most 
practical  way  that  for  which  philosophy  had  searched 
in  vain.  We  shall  not,  I  think,  misrepresent  the  teach- 
ing of  Jesii^j  if  we  say  that  it  consisted  in  showing 
(1)  what  true  peace  of  soul  is,  (2)  what  is  the  essential 
condition  of  thaLpeace.  He  said :  The  soul  finds  peace 
only  in  love,  such  as  takes  the  form  of  beneficent  action 
toward  one's  fellows  ;  and  the  condition  of  such  human 
love  is  divine  love,  taking  the  form  of  obedience  to  the 
mystic  voice  uttering  itself  in  the  soul  and  claiming 
authority,  as  coming  from  the  Supreme  Personality 
which  is  the  condition  of  our  being. 

If  we  consider  for  a  moment  this  teaching,  we  shall 
see  (1)  that  it  not  onlv  accords  with  the  fundamental 
.     principles  of  moral  freedom  enunciated  bj  Socrates, 
V^^t  that  it  lifts  that  principle  out  of  abstractness  into 
jJ^concreteness,  giving  its  empty  form  an  all-sufficfeht 
^t Content;  (2)  that  it  thus  supplies  the  very  element  for 
y^      which  all  the  philosophies  of  the  time  had  been  search- 
ing in  vain,  a  practical  andJ:^eaiizable  form  of  life  capa- 
ble of  being  developed  into  an  cecumenic  social  order r 
and  (3)  that  it  THrows  back  the  light  of  a  universal 
meaning  and  purpose  upon  the  whole  course  of  Greek 
education,  which  but  for  it  would  have  ended  in  super- 
stition, skepticism,  or  despair.    If,  moreover,  reverting 
to  the  first  of  these  points,  we  ask  whence  the  Nazarene 
derived  that  content  with  which  he  filled  the  abstract 
form  of  Socrates,  we  shall  find  that  it  came  from  the 
exercise  of  a  faculty  which  Socrates  had  been  dimly 
conscious  of  in  himself,  but  whose  nature  and  object 

f  There  seems  no  good  reason  for  assuming  that  Jesus  was 
unacquainted  with  the  philosophic  and  religious  movements  of 
his  time. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.   I95 

he  had  never  brought  into  clearness — the  sense  of  the 
supernatural  and  eternal.  He  had  felt  in  his  soul  the 
presence  of  something  divine  (Sai/xovtov  rt),  guiding  him 
to  a  goal  higher  than  any  that  he  could  see,  and  he  had 
piously  followed  it  with  humble  faith ;  but  his  dim, 
confused  Hellenic  conceptions  of  the  divine  nature 
had  prevented  him  from  seeing  its  true  meaning. 
Jesus  not  only  felt  the  same  thing  in  a 'far  higher 
degree,  but  with  his  lofty  Hebrew  conception  of  God 
he  was  enabled  to  interpret  his  feeling,  and  say,  I  and 
the  Father  are  one.  In  this  way  he  rose  to  the  clear 
consciousness  of  a  personal  God,  the  unity  and  spring 
of  that  universal  reason  in  which  all  mankind  are  one, 
and  through  which  alone  they  can  enter  into  a  free 
corporate  union.  The  followers  of  Socrates,  even  Plato 
and  Aristotle,  had  almost  completely  failed  to  catch 
the  meaning  and  bearing  of  Socrates's  "  daemon,"  or 
faculty  of  direct  divine  experience,  and  had  tried  to 
reach  the  divine  by  a  mere  dialectic  process.  As  a 
result  they  reached  only  a  bald  abstraction — the  Good, 
the  Prime  Movent — which  they  vainly  tried  to  substi- 
tute for  the  living  God  of  actual  experience.  The  im- 
mediate followers  of  Jesus  being,  like  himself,  trained  * 
in  Judaism,  were  more  fortunate.  Instead  of  substitut- 
ing dialectic  subtlety  for  divine  experience,  they  tried, 
following  the  example  of  their  master,  to  cultivate  that 
experience,  and  formed  themselves  into  a  society  for 
that  purpose;-  This  society  which  Jesus,  with  a  true 
comprehension  of  its  inner  character,  had  called  the 
"kingdom  of  heaven,"  or   the   "kingdom   of   God," 

A 

*  On  the  Jewish  feeling  with  regard  to  God,  see  Prof.  W. 
Robertson  Smith's  Prophets  of  Israel,  Lecture  I. 


196      EDUCATION  OP  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

was  what  became  known  later  by  a  mere  external 
designation  as  the  Church.  In  this  society  the  faculty 
of  divine  experience  received  the  name  of  faith,  which 
thus  became  the  very  life-principle  of  the  new  insti- 
tution. 

It  is  of  the  utmost  importance  that,  before  pro- 
ceeding further,  we  should  understand  the  nature  and 
place  of  faith,  and  this  for  two  reasons :  (1)  because  it 
is  what  gives  meaning  and  completeness  to  Greek  edu- 
cation, and  (2)  because  the  failure  to  comprehend  its 
sphere  and  its  relations  to  reason  is  what  has  given 
rise  to  nearly  all  the  theological  and  religious  difficul- 
ties that  have  proved  so  detrimental  to  religion  and  to 
thought. 

Faith,  then,  is  the  sense  ojLthe  supernatural.  It 
bears  the  same  relation  to  this  that  the  so-called  bodily 
senses  bear  to  the  world  of  Nature.*  And  just  as  our 
reason  out  of  bodily  sensations  and  its  own  resources 
constructs  an  external  physical  world  of  related  things 
or  determined  effects,  so  it  constructs  out  of  the  data 
of  faith  and  its  own  resources  an  inner  moral  world  of 
related  spirits  or  self-determining  causes.  Reason  may 
err  in  either  case,  giving  us  a  Ptolemaic  astronomy  or 
a  Mohammedan  religion  ;  but  this  does  not  affect  the 
data  of  the  senses,  or  the  possibility  of  ultimate  truth 
based  on  exhaustive  experience. 

It  was  a  very  long  time  before  the  Greeks  dis- 
covered the  relation  of  the  faith-begotten  principles 
of  Jesus  to  their  own  intellectual  and  moral  achieve- 
ments, to   the   results  of  their  own   education.     At 

*  "  Nature  is  the  principle  of  movement  and  change."  Aris- 
totle, Physics,  iii,  1 :  200  b  12.  In  this  sense  I  am  using  the 
word. 


m   CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.  197 

the  first  glance  they  seemed  mere  foolishness.*  Nor 
need  we  wonder  at  this,  when  we  consider  with  what 
attachments  of  crude  material  myth  and  legend  they 
were  first  presented  to  them.  We  are  certainly  right 
in  holding  that  true  Christianity  is  primitive  Chris- 
tianity—that is,  the  great  life-principles  proclaimed 
and  lived  out  by  Jesus ;  but  we  must  not  forget  that 
these  formed  but  a  very  small  part  of  what  was  taught 
as  Christianity  almost  from  the  beginning  of  its  career. 
It  took  all  the  resources  of  Greek  thought  for  centuries 
to  force  upon  what  was  presented  as  Christian  truth  a 
meaning  which  intelligence  could  in  any  way  accept ; 
and,  after  all,  the  result  was  one  in  which  Jesus  would 
hardly  have  recognized  anything  of  his  own.  And  this 
leads  us  to  consider  the  relation  of  Christianity  to  Hel- 
lenism. 

When  Christianity  appeared,  it  came  into  a  world 
more  or  less  saturated  with  philosophic  and  practical 
Hellenism.  Not  only  had  Greek  modes  of  life  become 
generally  prevalent  all  over  the  East,  but  Greek  ways 
of  thinking  had  permeated  all  the  religions;  not,  how- 
ever, without  being  themselves,  -  in  turn,  influenced 
by  these.  The  most  conspicuous  results  of  this  syn- 
cretism were  Neopythagoreanism,  Orientalized  Hellen- 
ism, Hellenized  Zoroastrianism,  and  Hellenized  Juda- 
ism, systems  which  were  gradually  replacing  the  ele- 
ments out  of  which  they  sprang.  With  all  of  these 
the  supernatural  teaching  of  Jesus  came  in  contact 

*  This  is  shown  in  a  very  striking  way  in  a  graffito  taken 
from  one  of  the  praetorian  guard-rooms  of  the  palace  of  the 
Ca'sars,  and  now  in  the  Kirchcrian  Museum  in  Rome.  It  rep- 
resents a  Greek,  Alexamenos,  praying  to  a  figure  with  an  ass's 
head  nailed  to  a  cross. 


198       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

almost  from  the  very  first,  and  toward  all  of  them  it 
had  to  adopt  a  certain  attitude,  on  pain  of  standing 
completely  isolated  and  ineffective.  To  Judaism,  pure 
and  simple,  it  was  closely  related  from  the  first,  being, 
indeed,  only  the  consummation  of  that  system.  Short- 
ly after  the  death  of  its  founder,  when  it  began  to 
make  its  way  in  the  Diaspora,  it  came  in  contact  with 
Hellenized  Judaism,  and  the  effect  of  this  is  already 
apparent  in  the  epistles  of  Paul,  the  epistle  to  the  He- 
brews, and  the  gospel  and  epistles  of  John.  Some- 
what later,  perhaps,  when  it  began  to  find  acceptance 
among  the  pagans,  it  had  to  encounter  Neopythago- 
reanism  and  Hellenized  Zoroastrianism,  the  former 
chiefly  in  Egypt,  the  latter  in  Syria  and  neighboring 
districts.  The  influence  of  the  former  is  manifest  in 
the  writings  of  Clement  of  Alexandria  and  Origen ;  of 
the  latter,  in  the  works  of  the  Gnostics,  of  Marcion, 
and  Montanus. 

Pure  Judaism,  in  so  far  as  it  conflicted  with  Chris- 
tianity, was  practically  overcome  by  Paul ;  but  Hellen- 
ized Judaism  proved  much  more  formidable.  "  Hel- 
lenism," says  Harnack,  "  has  also  a  share  in  Paul.  .  .  . 
Paul  adapted  the  gospel  of  Christ  to  the  Greek  mode 
of  thinking."  *  The  same  is  true,  in  even  a  higher 
degree,  of  the  author  of  the  epistle  to  the  Hebrews, 
which  is  deeply  tinged  with  Aristotelianism,  while  the 
gospel  and  epistles  of  John  are  almost  saturated  with 
Philonism  and  its  doctrine  of  the  Logos.  When  we 
pass  beyond  the  limits  of  the  New  Testament  and  the 
"  apostolic  "  writings,  we  find  a  Christianity  that  has 
undergone  the  influence  both  of  Hellenized  Zoroas- 

*  Doc/mengeschichte,  vol.  i,  p.  83  (2d  ed.). 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.  I99 

triauism  and  of  Orientalized  Hellenism,  which  we 
may  call  Neopythagoreanism.  In  the  hands  of  the 
Gnostics,*  of  Marcion  and  Montanus,  it  has  become  a 
dualistic  theory  of  deliverance  for  man  from  the  power 
of  darkness,  and  of  restoration  to  the  kingdom  of  light ; 
in  those  of  Clement  and  Origen,  a  philosophy  of  ascent 
from  the  material  to  the  ideal  world.  The  former  was 
combined  with  a  theurgic,  mysterious  ritual ;  the  latter 
with  an  ascetic  mysticism,  which  finally  took  form  in 
monachism.  It  was  out  of  the  union  of  all  these  dif- 
ferent modifications  of  Christ's  teaching  that  there  re- 
sulted what  is  known  to  the  world  as  Catholic  Chris- 
tianity, with  its  Hebrew  god,  its  PMlonian  Logos,  its 
Gnostic  mysteries  and  ritual,  and  its  Neopythagorean 
mysticism  and  asceticism,  f 

It  is  no  part  of  the  aim  of  this  lecture  to  trace  all 
the  changes  undergone  by  Christianity  through  its 
contact  with  Hellenism  and  Hellenized  Oriental  re- 
ligions ;  my  endeavor  is  merely  to  show  how  Hellenism 
was  supplemented  and  developed  through  them.  We 
have  seen  that,  under  the  influence  of  the  East,  the 
different  schools  of  Greek  thought  (excepting  always 
the  "  godless  Epicurean  ")  had  taken  a  religious  bent, 
and  converged  into  what  we  might  call  Neopythago- 
reanism. We  have  likewise  seen  that  this  last  deeply 
influenced  Christianity.    But  the  influence  was  not  all 

*  "  All  are  agreed  that  a  particular  person — namely,  Simon 
the  Magian,  is  to  be  regarded  as  the  root  of  the  heresy  "  ("  gnos- 
ticism "). — Harnack,  Dogmengeschichte,  vol.  i,  p.  205  sg. 

f  Consult  in  this  connection  Drummond,  Philo  Judceus ; 
Bigg,  The  Christian  Platonists  of  Alexandria  ;  Hatch,  The  In- 
fluence of  Greek  Ideas  and  Usages  upon  the  Christian  Church  ; 
Harnack,  Dogmengeschichte,  vol.  i. 


200      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

on  one  side  ;  Christianity  influenced  Neopythagorean- 
ism,  and  turned  it  into  that  last  marvelous  product  of 
the  Greek  mind,  Neoplatonism. 

It  is  usual  to  regard  Plotinus  as  the  founder  of  this 
system,  as  he  is  its  most  distinguished  exponent ;  but 
it  can  hardly  be  said  to  have  any  founder,  since  it  is 
nothing  more  than  the  natural  outcome  of  the  tend- 
ency of  Christianity  to  absorb  Hellenism  and  Ori- 
entalism. In  Clement  and  Origen  the  Christian  ele- 
ment in  the  compound  still  holds  the  upper  hand, 
and,  accordingly,  these  call  themselves  Christians ;  * 
but  in  Ammonius  Saccas,  a  pupil  of  the  latter,  the 
balance  turns  the  other  way.  He  accordingly  drops 
the  Christian  name  and  champions  a  syncretism  of 
Gnosticism,  Neopythagoreanism,  and  Christianity, 
which  later  on  was  known  as  Neoplatonism.  His  pur 
pil  was  Plotinus,  of  whom  it  has  been  said  :  "  The 
true- Gnostic,  though  he  repudiates  the  name,  is  Plo- 
tinus. The  logical  development  of  the  thoughts  of 
Basilides  and  Justin,  of  Valentinus  and  the  Naassenes, 
is  found  in  Neoplatonism — that  splendid  vision  of  in- 
comparable and  irrecoverable  cloudland,  in  which  the 
sun  of  Greek  philosophy  set."  f  If  ^^  ^sk  why  it  was 
cloudland,  the  answer  is.  Because,  while  absorbing  the 
exhalations  of  all  the  great  systems  of  thought,  it  re- 
jected that  which  alone  could  have  given  them  reality, 
and  thus,  instead  of  disencumbering  the  way  to  heaven, 

*  Origen,  however,  went  so  far  that  the  Alexandrine  Church 
expelled  him,  and  in  the  fifth  oecumenical  council  many  of  his 
teachings  were  condemned.  See  Denzinger,  Enchiridion  Sym- 
bolonim  et  Definitionum  pp.  57-62. 

f  Hatch,  The  Influence  of  Greek  Ideas  and  Usages  upon  the 
Christian  Churchy  p.  l32  sq. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  EASTERN  WORLD.  201 

became  a  nebulous  mass  darkening  the  face  of  it.  Neo- 
platonism,  even  at  its  best,  reaches  no  personal,  intelli- 
gent first  principle,  no  being  of  love  and  choice  and  will, 
but  only  a  bald  abstraction,  to  which,  in  its  desire  to 
secure  transcendence,  it  denies  even  the  attribute  of 
being.  Not  possessing  the  first  condition  or  even  the 
conception  of  concrete  moral  life,  it  can  make  no  effort 
and  contribute  no  motive,  toward  the  realization  of  that 
life.  It  can  only  call  upon  men  to  aspire  to  the  primal 
nonentity,  which  in  no  way  differs  from  nirvana^  by 
an  ascetic,  world-spurning  process  of  self-emptying, 
which  is  hostile  not  only  to  the  social  conditions  of 
moral  life,  but  also  to  human  life  of  any  kind.  Nor 
need  we  be  surprised  at  this  result.  It  is  the  only  one 
which  any  system  of  philosophy  or  religion  which  seeks 
to  find  the  Supreme  Being  by  an  intellectual  process, 
without  a  supernatural  experience,  can  possibly  reach. 
History  has  demonstrated  this  many  times.  Neopla- 
tonism,  where  it  is  not  held  in  subordination,  is  fatal  to 
true  religion,  and  even  to  true  philosophy.  Wherever, 
in  its  union  with  religion,  it  has  gained  the  upper  hand, 
it  has  resulted  in  false  mysticism,  morbid  self-con- 
sciousness, paralysis  of  the  will,  moral  death.  The 
Christian  Church  has  fought  its  influences  for  sixteen 
hundred  years  ;  it  is  fighting  them  to-day.  Wherever 
Neoplatonism  gives  tone  to  philosophy,  the  result  is 
an  empty  dialectic  idealism,  arrogantly  spurning  the 
world  of  concrete  reality. 

But  though  Greek  philosophy  and  Greek  educa- 
tion, as  such,  came  to  a  sad  end  in  Neoplatonism, 
their  career  was  by  no  means  closed.  They  had  proved, 
indeed,  incapable  by  themselves  of  steering  the  ship  of 
the  world's  life,  and  had  thenceforth  to  take  a  subor-  * 


202      EDUCATION  OF  TUE  GREEK   PEOPLE. 

dinate  position,  and  sail  under  a  flag  not  their  own ; 
but  under  that  flag,  and  guided  by  a  higher  hand,  they 
did  admirable  service,  such  as  could  have  been  per- 
formed by  them  alone.  Of  this  service  we  shall  treat 
in  our  next  chapter. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

GREEK    EDUCATIOiq-    IN"    CONTACT  WITH    THE    GREAT 
WESTERN"   WORLD — RESUME   AKD   CON^CLUSION". 

I  HAVE  carried  on  the  account  of  Hellenism  in  its 
relations  to  the  East  until  the  time  when  it  ceased  to 
be  an  independent  influence.  But  long  before  that  it 
had  entered  into  relations  with  the  West,  and  these 
were  very  different  from  the  other.  In  the  East  it  had 
been  a  master ;  in  the  West  it  was  a  servant.  For, 
however  true  might  be  Horace's  saying  that  "  captive 
Greece  took  captive  her  rude  conqueror,"  she  did  not 
on  that  account  become  the  master  of  her  captive,  but 
only  his  teacher,  and  this  she  could  do,  and  did,  in  the 
position  of  a  slave.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  many  very 
learned  Greek  teachers  were  chattel  slaves,  or  at  best 
freedmen — for  example,  Epictetus,  Tyrannion,  etc. 

The  Greeks  seem  to  have  come  but  little  in  contact 
with  the  Romans  until  after  the  time  of  Alexander. 
They  are  not  even  mentioned  by  any  Greek  author,  I 
think,  before  Aristotle.  It  was  not  till  about  200  B.  c, 
after  the  close  of  the  second  Punic  war,  that  the  Greeks 
began  to  find  their  way  to  Rome  and  to  exert  an  influ- 
ence there.  For  some  time  even  after  that  this  influ- 
ence was  slight;  but  when,  in  the  year  146,  Greece  be- 
came a  Roman  province,  the  Greeks  began  to  pour  into 


204      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

Kome,  carrying  with  them  their  culture,  their  educa- 
tion, and  their  philosophy.  In  vain  did  Rome  try  first 
to  resist,  and  then  to  rival  them.  She  had  become  a 
cosmopolitan  state,  and  she  had  to  adopt  a  cosmopoli- 
tan culture  if  she  was  to  maintain  herself  as  such.  This 
culture  Hellenism  alone  could  give,  and  so  she  had  to 
adopt  Greek  education  and  all  that  was  implied  in  or 
followed  from  that — Greek  art,  Greek  philosophy, 
Greek  religion,  Greek  modes  of  life — in  a  word,  Greek 
civilization,  such  as  it  was  in  the  second  century  B.  c 
But  a  borrowed  civilization,  like  a  borrowed  coat,  rare- 
ly fits  the  borrower,  and  so  it  proved  in  this  case.  What 
suited  an  intellectual,  aesthetic  people  like  the  Greeks 
was  ill  adapted  for  an  active,  volitional  people  like  the 
Romans.  It  might,  indeed,  polish — or  rather  veneer — 
them,  but  at  the  same  time  it  necessarily  paralyzed 
them.  Naturally  enough,  too,  they  borrowed  the  husk 
rather  than  the  kernel  of  it.  The  older  Greek  educa- 
tion had  aimed  at  producing  capable  citizens,  the  later 
at  producing  sages.  That  which  the  Romans  borrowed 
did  neither.  It  produced  mostly  dilettanti  and  rhetori- 
cians. Roman  literature,  Roman  art,  Roman  phi^oso- 
phy  are  but  feeble  imitations  of  Greek.  Whatever  the 
Roman  had  to  learn  from  the  Greek,  in  that  he  was 
inferior  to  him.  But  there  was  one  thing  in  which 
the  Roman  had  nothing  to  learn  from  the  Greek,  and 
everything  to  teach  him,  and  that  was  statesmanship, 
or  political  science.  In  that  the  Greek,  at  his  best,  was 
a  dilettanti,  while  the  Roman  was  a  master,  as,  indeed, 
the  actual  relations  of  the  two  clearly  demonstrated. 
Whatever,  therefore,  is  of  interest  in  the  career  of  Hel- 
lenism in  the  West  is  confined  to  its  relations  with 
Roman  statesmanship. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.   205 

Rome,  as  a  cosmopolitan  state,  needed — and  vaguely 
knew  that  she  needed — a  cosmopolitan  religion.  Real- 
izing that  her  old  ethnic  religion,  even  with  Greek 
modifications  and  additions,  was  not  equal  to  the  need, 
she  opened  her  doors  freely  to  all  religions,  as  if  a  coirt? 
bination  of  them  might  effect  what  one  was  unequa^; 
then,  finding  that  this  measure  did  not  answer,  and  dis- 
covering nowhere  a  god  who  could  command  universal 
adoration,  she  fell  upon  the  strange  expedient  of  setting 
up  her  emperor  as  a  god,  building  temples  and  altars 
to  him,  and  commanding  that  he  should  be  universally 
adored.*  But  though  Rome  could  to  a  certain  degree 
regulate  the  actions  of  her  subjects,  she  could  not  com- 
mand their  wills  or  determine  their  faith.  She  could 
not  turn  the  worship  of  the  emperor,  even  though 
identified  with  her  own  genius,  into  a  religion.  And 
so  the  demand  for  a  cosmopolitan  religion  which 
should  supply  a  moral  sanction  for  the  institutions  of 
the  Roman  state,  as  it  had  come  to  be,  remained  un- 
satisfied. Meanwhile  the  people  lived  along  as  best  they 
could,  either  upon  their  old  religions,  or  upon  new  re- 
ligions introduced  from  the  East,  or  upon  some  form 
of  Greek  philosophy,  or,  finally,  without  any  religion 
at  all,  the  resources  of  the  state,  in  the  form  of  brute 
force,  making  up  to  a  large  extent  for  the  want  of  a 
religious  or  moral  bond.  But  it  was  felt  and  recog- 
nized by  all  earnest  and  thoughtful  men  that  this  con- 
dition of  things  could  not  be  permanent ;  that  sooner 

*  Given  the  ideas  of  God  prevalent  at  that  time,  this  could 
not  seem  so  strange  or  outrageous  to  the  Romans  as  it  does  to 
us.  See  Ilarnack,  Dogmengeschichte,  vol.  i,  p.  103  sq.  Fried- 
liinder,  Darstellungen  aus  der  Siitengeschichte  Eoms,  vol.  iii, 
p.  455  sqq. 


206      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

or  later  the  state  must  find  a  moral  bond,  if  it  was  to 
exist  at  all,  and  that  this  moral  bond  must  be  a  re- 
ligion. And  the  demand  created  a  supply.  From 
time  to  time,  ever  from  the  establishment  of  the  cbcu- 
menic  empire,  systems  had  risen  which  declared  them- 
selves capable  of  satisfying  it.  First  there  were  the 
four  great  schools  of  Greek  philosophy :  Platonism, 
Aristoteliauism,  Stoicism,  and,  strangely  enough.  Epi- 
cureanism, each  of  which  had  a  large  and  influential 
following.  Then  came  various  Eastern  religions — Isis- 
worship,  Mithras-worship,  etc. — whiclT^ppealed  to  cer- 
tain deep,  mysterious  needs  of  human  nature,  and  were 
widely  popular,  all  the  more  so  that  they  had  been 
greatly  transformed  under  Greek  influence.  Lastly 
there  was  Judaism,  compassing  sea  and  land  to  make 
one  proselyte,  and  making  a  large  number  in  all  parts 
of  the  empire.  But  each  and  all  of  these  proved,  upon 
trial,  to  lack  some  element  necessary  to  insure  universal 
acceptance.  The  Greek  philosophies  *  appealed  only 
to  the  few  cultivated,  and  therefore  were  unfit  for  use 
as  an  imperial  religion.  The  Eastern  worships  were 
too  unearthly  and  individualistic  to  answer  the  pur- 
pose,! while  Judaism  was  ruled  out  by  the  fact  that  it 

*  These  had  come  to  Rome  directly  from  Athens  soon  after 
the  conquest  of  Greece,  and  therefore  unaffected  by  Alexandrine 
syncretism.  Aristotelianism,  having  no  religious  leanings,  never 
put  in  any  claim  to  be  a  religion.  It  may  be  doubted  if  any  one 
ever  tried  to  live  by  it. 

f  If  Mithras-worship  could  have  belied  its  Zoroastrian  dual- 
istic  origin,  and  done  away  with  its  burdensome,  gloomy  ritual, 
due  to  the  same,  it  might  have  had  a  fair  chance  of  becoming 
CECumenic.  "  The  disciples  of  Mithras  formed  an  organized 
church  with  a  developed  hierarchy.  They  possessed  the  ideas 
of  mediation,  atonement,  and  a  Saviour  who  is  human  and  yet 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  207 

was  essentially  an  etlmic  religion,  maintaining  an  in- 
effaceable distinction  between  Jejv  and  Gentile. 

TkeseweTETtte  principal  systems  that  offered  them- 
selves when  the  need  was  first  felt,  and  before  the  Alex- 
andrine syncretisms  found  their  way  to  Eome.  After 
that  time  there  were  three  great  systems  which  put  in 
claims,  all  of  which  for  a  certain  time  looked  as  if  they 
might  be  accepted.  These,  to  name  them  in  their 
order,  were  Christianity,  Neoplatonism,  and  Manichas- 
ism.  All  of  them  contained  practically  the  same  in- 
gredients, only  commingled  in  different  proportions. 
The  first  was  prevailingly  Jewish,  but  with  a  very  large 
admixture  of  Hellenism,  and  not  a  few  features  derived 
from  Zoroastrianism  through  Gnosticism.  The  second 
was  prevailingly  Greek,  but  contained  distinct  and  im- 
portant elements  derived  from  Judaism  (through  early 
Christianity)  and  Zoroastrianism.*  The  third  was  fun- 
damentally Zoroastrian,  but  contained  Hellenic,  Judaic, 
and,  it  is  said,  even  Brahmanic  and  Buddhistic  ele- 
ments. 

Christianity  was  by  two  centuries  first  in  the  field. 
About  the  year  200  A.  D.,  when  it  had  taken  definite 
form,  had  overcome  its  most  insidious  enemies — the 
Jews  and  the  Gnostics — and  was  beginning  to  claim 
universality,  it  had  from  the  simple  instinct  of  self- 
preservation  become  completely  Hellenized.     Having 

divine,  and  not  only  the  idea  but  the  doctrine  of  a  future  fife. 
They  had  a  cucharist  and  a  baptism,  and  other  curious  analo- 
gies might  be  pointed  out  between  their  system  and  the  Church 
of  Christ. — Bigg,  The  Christian  Platonists  of  Alexandria,  p. 
240. 

*  Plotinus  made  a  vain  effort  to  reach  Babylon  and  study 
Zoroastrianism  at  its  source. — Porphyry,  Life  of  Plotinus,  cap.  3. 
15 


208      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

been  forced  to  face  foes  clad  in  a  panoply  of  Greek 
philosophy  and  rhetoric,  it  had  in  self-defense  donned 
the  same,  and  in  doing  so  had  transformed  itself  from 
a  historical  belief  and  a  rule  of  life  into  a  metaphysical 
theory  and  a  creed.  Looking  back  upon  the  simplicity 
and  moral  effectiveness  of  primitive  Christianity,  we 
may  regret  this  as  a  corruption  and  an  enfeeblement, 
and  so,  indeed,  it  was ;  but  it  was  unavoidable,  if  Chris- 
tianity was  to  outlive  the  direct  personal  influence  of 
its  founder  and  make  its  way  in  the  great  world. 
Moreover,  in  becoming  Hellenized  it  had  not  laid 
aside  the  two  things  which  distinguished  it  from 
Hellenism — its  faith,  or  supernatural  sense,  and  its 
belief  in  a  personal  God,  and  of  a  real  incarnation 
of  God  in  man.  These  were  all  that  it  had  to  give  to 
Hellenism,  and  they  were  all  that  Hellenism  lacked. 
For  these  it  had  fought,  and  was  ready  to  fight,  to  the 
bitter  end.  Thus  the  Christianity  of  the  third  cen- 
tury— let  us  say,  in  a  word,  Catholic  Christianity — was 
Orientalized  Hellenism  supplemented  by  faith,  a  su- 
preme personal  God,  and  an  incarnate  Saviour-God. 

What  this  Hellenism  amounted  to  without  this  ad- 
dition we  may  see  in  Neoplatonism,  which  next  pre- 
sented itself  as  the  universal  religion.  This  system,  as 
we  have  seen,  had  arisen  out  of  a  combination  of  Neo- 
pythagoreanism  *  and  certain  Christian  tendencies  de- 
rived from  Origen.  It  seems  to  have  been  this  element 
and  earnestness  that  gave  it  consistency  and  force ;  for 
Neopythagoreanism  without  it  became,  after  the  Chris- 
tian era,  an  ever  more  and  more  fantastic,  theurgic,  and 

*  Perhaps  that  form  of  it  held  by  Numenius.  See  Bigg,  The 
Christian  Piaionists,  p.  250  sqq. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  209 

degraded  system.  Toward  the  close  of  the  second  cen- 
tury it  tried  to  set  itself  up  as  a  rival  to  Christianity,  by 
copying  its  external  features  to  mask  its  paganism  in. 
For  Moses  it  set  up  Pythagoras ;  for  the  Law  and  the 
Prophets,  the  Pythagorean,  Orphic,  and  Platonic  writ- 
ings; for  Jesus,  Apollonius  of  Tyana;  and  for  the 
Gospel,  the  romance  of  this  man's  life  written  by  the 
elegant  rhetorician  Philostratus  at  the  command  of  a 
Koman  empress.*  This  foolish  attempt  did  nothing 
more  than  show  that  paganism  felt  itself  vanquished. 
Practical  results  it  had  none.  The  case  was  different 
with  Neoplatonism,  which,  with  its  strong  spiritual 
leanings  and  earnest  desire  after  purity  of  life,  dis- 
carded much  that  was  fantastical<^and  sought  to  reach 
God  by  an  ascetic  intellectual  process)  But,  in  discard- 
ing the  fantastical,  it  discarded  also  the  supernatural 
sense,  and  in  carrying  its  Hellenic  intellectualism  to  its 
final  results  it  reached  an  inane  first  principle,  which, 
being  beyond  human  knowledge,  was  also  beyond 
human  sympathy  and  love,  and  could  therefore  offer 
neither  moral  sanctions  nor  a  basis  for  concrete  moral 
life.  Besides  this,  it  labored  under  the  difficulty  which 
must  always  attach  to  a  philosophical  religion — it  ap- 
pealed only  to  the  cultivated  and  the  learned.  It  was, 
therefore,  from  every  point  of  view,  unfit  to  be  a  world- 
religion. 

Almost  contemporary  with  the  rise  of  Neoplatonism 
was  that  of  Manichasism,  long  supposed  to  have  been  a 
mere  Christian  heresy,  but  now  known  to  have  been  a 

*  In  reading  this  work  one  is  tempted  to  exclaim  at  every 
page,  How  little  did  even  the  most  cultivated  Greek  or  Roman . 
understand  what  Christianity  really  meant ;  how  incapable  was 
either  of  inventing  it ! 


210      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

mixture  of  Zoroastrian,  Chaldaean,  Christian,  and  per- 
haps other  elements.*  Its  foundation  seems  to  have 
been  Zoroastrian  dualism.  Ut  was  thoroughly  materi- 
alistic and  fantastical,  and  shows  but  to  a  very  slight 
degree  the  influence  of  Hellenism.  For  this  reason  it 
lies  beyond  our  horizon.  Besides  this,  though  it  made 
many  converts  and  exercised  a  wide  influence  in  the 
East,  it  came  too  late  into  the  West  to  have  any  chance 
of  success. 

Between  these  three  systems,  which  offered  to  take 
the  place  of  an  oecumenic  religion,  the  choice,  if  choice 
there  was  to  be,  could  not  be  doubtful.  Between  (1)  a 
religion  with  a  personal  God,  incarnate  in  man,  a  high 
system  of  ethics  and  a  principle  suited  to  become  the 
basis  of  free  institutions,  (2)  a  religion  which  was 
merely  a  sublimated  and  fanciful  philosophy  of  nature, 
with  neither  living  God  nor  ethical  principle,  and  (3)  a 
religion  which  was  but  a  coarse  materialism,  imposing 
material  rites,  instead  of  moral  action,  as  the  condition 
of  salvation,  the  difference  was  clear  enough.  And 
even  had  Rome  hesitated  to  choose,  it  would  have  made 
no  difference.  Christianity  conquered  by  its  own  in- 
herent strength,  which  is  always  the  best  and  the  final 
test  of  the  truth  of  a  system.  In  the  first  quarter  of 
the  fourth  century  the  Roman  Empire,  in  the  person  of 
Constantino,  recognized  that  it  had  found  the  long 
desiderated  imperial  religion,  and  Christianity  became 
'the  religion  of  the  state.  From  this  time  on,  all  other 
religions  and  all  candidates  for  universality — pagan- 


*  On  Mani  and  his  religion,  see  Spiegel,  Erdnische  Alter- 
thumskunde,  vol.  ii,  pp.  195-232 ;  Haraack,  Dogmengeschichte^ 
vol.  i,  pp.  737-751. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  211 

ism,  Neoplatonism,  Manichseism — were  regarded  with 
disfavor,  placed  at  a  disadvantage,  and  as  fast  as  pos- 
sible proscribed. 

But  though  Hellenized  Christianity  had  thus  tri- 
umphed, there  still  remained  a  serious  difficulty. 
Among  its  professors  there  were  wide  differences  of 
opinion  as  to  what  Christianity  really  was,  and,  while 
these  continued,  it  could  not  truly  become  the  religion 
— that  is,  the  sustaining  moral  bond  and  sanction — of 
the  state.  Accordingly,  the  head  of  the  state  now  set 
to  work  to  bring  about  complete  unity  of  opinion  as  to 
what  constituted  Christianity,  and  for  this  purpose 
called  the  Council  of  Nicjea  (a.  d.  325),  to  formulate  a 
catholic  or  universal  creed.  In  the  composition  of  this, 
and  the  determination  of  its  different  articles,  Greek 
philosophy  played  a  considerable  part;  at  the  same 
time  several  definitions  were  made  for  the  express  pur- 
pose of  checking  its  supremacy,  and  compelling  it,  so 
to  speak,  to  accept  that  supplement  without  which  it 
would  necessarily  fall  back  to  the  rank  of  Neoplato- 
nism.  Indeed,  such  would  probably  have  been  its  fate 
had  the  doctrines  of  Arius  been  accepted.  However 
repugnant,  therefore,  some  of  the  articles  of  the 
Nicene  Creed  may  be  to  human  reason,  and  however 
true  it  may  be  that  they  put  an  end  to  all  rational 
theology,  it  was  nevertheless  these  very  articles  that 
saved  Christianity  * — and  Hellenism. 

*  "  One  need  not  be  an  orthodox  trinitarian  to  see  that,  if 
Arianisra  had  had  its  way,  the  theology  of  Christianity  would 
have  become  of  a  kind  in  wliich  no  modern  philosopher,  who 
had  outgrown  the  demonism  of  ancient  systems,  could  for  a 
moment  acquiesce." — Thomas  Hill  Green,  Christian  Dogma^ 
Works,  vol.  iii,  p.  173. 


212       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

Though  we  may  perhaps  say  that  Neoplatonism,  or 
pure  Hellenism,  was  overcome  at  the  Council  of  Nicaea, 
just  as  pure  Judaism  had  been  at  the  Council  of  Jeru- 
salem, still  Neoplatonism  did  not  cease  to  influence 
Christianity,  to  saturate  it  more  and  more  with  Hel- 
lenism. Less,  probably,  than  a  hundred  years  after  the 
Nicene  Council,  there  appeared  a  series  of  works  pre- 
senting a  more  complete  syncretism  between  Chris- 
tianity and  iN'eoplatonism  than  had  ever  been  known 
before.  These  works,  long  attributed — no  one  knows 
why — to  Dionysius the  x\reopagite  *  (Acts,  xvii, 34),  pro- 
foundly influenced  the  teachings  and  practice  of  the 
Church  in  all  succeeding  ages,  being  the  chief  source 
of  Christian  mysticism  and  of  the  mediasval  type  of 
piety.  Had  their  tendency  ever  completely  gained  the 
upper  hand,  Christianity  would  have  become  a  species 
of  Neoplatonic  asceticism.  Fortunately,  their  influence 
was,  confined  to  the  East  for  many  centuries. 

When  Hellenized  Christianity  became  the  religion 
of  the  Roman  Empire  it  was  expected  to  stand  in  the 
same  relation  of  solidarity  to  it  in  which  the  ancient 
pagan  religions  had  stood  to  their  respective  states — 
to  form  its  bond  and  sanction.  But,  in  reality,  the  at- 
tempt to  make  it  do  so  was  a  pouring  of  new  wine  into 
old  skins,  against  which  Jesus  had  warned  his  follow- 
ers. Christianity,  whose  aim  was  to  develop  the  free 
moral  personality  of  the  individual,  could  not  be  the 
sanction  of  an  institution  which,  with  all  its  cosmo- 
politanism, had  never  overcome  the  old  Greek  and 
Roman  notion  that  the  citizen  and  the  man  are  iden- 


*  See  Bishop  Westcott,  Religious  Thought  of  the  West,  pp. 
142  sqq. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  213 

tical.  Heuce  the  union  of  church  and  empire  could 
only  result  in  one  of  two  things :  either  (1)  the  church 
must  remain  a  mere  impotent  appendage  to  the  empire, 
leaving  it  without  any  moral  bond  or  sanction,  or  else 
(2)  it  must  disintegrate  the  empire  and  build  up  a  new 
institution  from  its  own  inner  force.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  both  happened,  the  former  in  the  eastern  portion 
of  the  empire,  the  latter  in  the  western.  In  the  East, 
the  empire  fell  slowly  to  decay  for  want  of  a  combining 
moral  sanction ;  in  the  West,  it  soon  went  entirely  to 
pieces,  and  on  its  ruins  rose  the  Eoman  Catholic 
Church,  the  true  institution  of  Hellenized  Christian- 
ity. The  reason  for  this  difference  of  result  is  due  to 
the  fundamental  difference  between  Greeks  and  Eo- 
mans.  The  former,  with  their  unconquerable  intel- 
lectual bent,  laid  chief  stress  upon  the  Hellenic  ideal 
elements  in  Christianity,  which  were  entirely  incapable 
of  forming  the  bond  of  a  concrete  moral  institution ; 
whereas  the  latter,  with  their  strong  volitional  and 
practical  tendencies,  emphasized  the  personal  and 
purely  Christian  elements,  which  were  admirably  fitted 
to  be  an  institutional  basis.  The  great  exponent  of 
this  Roman  development  is  Augustine,  in  whom  Chris- 
tianity, Hellenism,  and  Romanism  are  blended  in  the 
most  fruitful  way. 

The  Roman  Catholic  Church,  then,  is  the  institu- 
tional realization  of  Hellenism,  as  subrelated  to,  and 
expository  of,  the  teachings  of  Jesus,  and  its  vigorous 
life  of  fifteen  hundred  years  proves  the  strength  of  the 
principle  which  underlies  it.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
feebleness  of  the  Eastern  Church,  with  its  excessive 
Hellenism  and  want  of  true  sense  of  the  personality 
and  incarnation  of  God,  became  most  painfully  mani- 


214      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

fest  when  it  had  to  encounter  the  strong  personal 
monotheism  of  Mohammedanism.  This  crude,  fan- 
tastic, and  material  system,  from  which  Hellenism  is 
absent,*  but  in  which  the  supernatural  sense  plays  a 
great  part,  revealing  the  personality  of  God,  enabled  a 
nation  of  semibarbarians  to  conquer  the  whole  domain 
of  the  Eastern  Empire,  and  almost  blot  out  Greek 
Christianity  from  the  face  of  the  earth.  It  did  the 
same  thing  for  dualistic  Zoroastrianism ;  but,  when  it 
tried  to  match  itself  with  Western  Christianity,  in 
which  Greek  idealism  and  Zoroastrian  dualism  were 
held  in  subjection,  it  found  a  power  far  superior  to  it. 
But,  for  all  that,  even  Western  Christianity  received  a 
strange  contribution  from  Islam  in  the  shape  of  a  fresh 
accession  of  Hellenism. 

Up  to  this  time  there  was  one  of  the  great  Greek 
philosophies — nay,  the  very  greatest — that  had  but  very 
slightly  contributed  to  Christianity.  This  was  Aris- 
totelianism.  Its  turn  had  now  come.  Owing  to  a 
series  of  circumstances  which  can  not  be  related  here,^ 
this  philosophy  had  come  into  a  certain  prominence  in 
the  fifth  century.  Being  found  uncongenial  to  West- 
ern Christianity,  and,  indeed,  to  orthodox  Christianity 
generally,  it  had  taken  refuge  among  some  heretical 
Eastern  sects,  such  as  the  Nestorians,  whose  school  at 
Nisibis  was  long  an  influential  centre  of*  peripateti- 
cism.  Thence  it  spread  over  a  large  portion  of  the 
East,  and  was  carried  by  physicians  even  into  Arabia. 
Hence  it  happened  that  when  Islam,  after  the  intoxi- 
cation of  its  first  triumphs,  began  to  call  for  culture, 

*  It  is  a  corapoiind  of  Judaism,  debased  Christianity,  Zoro- 
ast^iani^m,  and  possibly  Manichjeism. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  215 

and  a  rational  form  in  which  to  express  its  victorious 
monotheism,  it  found  Aristotelianism  ready  to  its  hand, 
and  adopted  it  without  question.  Hardly  anything 
could  have  been  more  fortunate.  Owing  to  its  combi- 
nation with  this  all-embracing  philosophy,  Islam  bade 
fair  not  only  to  conquer  the  world  by  force  of  arms, 
but  also  to  rule  it  by  the  indefeasible  right  of  superior 
intelligence.  This  is  not  the  place  to  describe  the 
Saracen  civilization,  or  even  its  great  schools  in  Cor- 
dova and  Bagdad,  to  all  of  which  the  world  owes  so 
I  much.  Suffice  it  to  say  that,  through  their  influence, 
I  the  philosophy  of  Aristotle  became  so  universally 
popular  in  the  twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries  as  to 
threaten  the  very  foundations  of  the  Christian  religion. 
In  course  of  time  the  Roman  Church  took  alarm  and 
tried  to  suppress  the  new  influence ;  but  finding  this 
impossible,  it  concluded  to  make  terms  with  the  in- 
truder. In  consequence,  the  works  of  Aristotle,  with- 
out Arab  additions  or  interpretations,  were  sought  out 
and  carefully  studied  by  the  greatest  intellects  of  the 
time — Alexander  of  Hales,  Albertus  Magnus,  Thomas 
Aquinas,  etc. — when  it  was  discovered  that,  instead  of 
being  foes  to  the  Church,  they  could  be  made  its  most 
effective  apologists  and  defenders.  Accordingly,  in 
the  course  of  a  few  years  a  new  synthesis  was  made 
between  Christianity  and  Aristotelianism,  and  this  be- 
came thenceforth,  and  is  to-day,  the  theology  of  the 
Roman  Church.*  The  aim  of  this  synthesis  was  noth- 
ing less  than  to  reduce  the  whole  of  human  knowledge 
to  a  perfect,  well-rounded  system  culminating  in  the- 


*  See  the  present  Pope's  Encyclical,  ^terni  Fatris,  issued  in 
1879. 


216      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

ology,  whose  organ  was  the  Church  and  whose  end  the 
vision  of  God.  In  previous  times,  Hellenism,  chiefly 
of  the  Stoic  and  Platonic  sort,  had  been  employed  to 
give  definiteness  and  defensible  form  to  particular  arti- 
cles of  faith ;  now,  in  the  form  of  Aristotelianism,  it 
was  used  to  rear  an  all-embracing  structure,  whose  top, 
like  that  of  the  tower  of  Babel,  was  to  reach  to  heaven,* 
and  enable  him  who  could  ascend  to  it  to  enjoy  the 
mystic  vision  of  God.  It  is  this  structure  that  Dante 
has  described  with  such  transcendent  power  in  his 
Divine  Comedy^  to  which,  as  he  says,  "heaven  and 
earth  put  a  hand."  The  hands  of  heaven  were  Au- 
gustine and  Dionysius ;  those  of  earth,  Aristotle  and 
Averroes. 

In  reading  this  great  work,  one  is  tempted  to  be- 
lieve that  now,  at  last,  Hellenism  has  reached  its  goal ; 
that,  crowned  with  the  concrete  beliefs  of  Christianity, 
it  has  elevated  man  to  moral  freedom,  to  the  image  of 
God.  But  it  is  not  so  ;  and  the  reasons  are  not  dif- 
ficult to  discover.  They  are  two,  and  both  are  due 
to  Hellenism.  The  first  is,  that  the  Church,  being 
organized  after  the  model  of  the  empire  which  she 
had  supplanted,  persisted  in  merging  the  Christian  in 
the  church-member,  as  the  latter  had  merged  the  man 
in  the  citizen ;  the  second,  that,  following  Plato,  Aris- 
totle, and  Plotinus,  she  made  the  supreme  end  of  man 
consist  in  vision,  an  act  of  the  intellect.  The  former  of 
these  defects  destroyed  the  moral  autonomy  of  the  in- 
dividual, the  latter  tended  to  withdraw  him  altogether 
from  practical  life,  in  which  the  moral  will  finds  its 

*  See  Bonaventura's  De  JRedncHone  Artium  ad  Theologiam, 
and  compare  his  Itinerarium  Mentis  in  Deum. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  217 

chief  sphere  of  action.  The  ideal^of  the  mediaeval 
Church  is  the  contemplative  saint ;  its  type  of  piety  is 
mysticism,*  in  which  not  only  the  will,  but  even  the  in- 
tellect, is  reduced  to  silence. f  Thus  the  failure  of  the 
mediaeval  Church  to  satisfy  the  demand  of  the  human 
soul  for  moral  freedom  was  due  to  the  fact  that  in  it 
Hellenism,  both  on  its  practical  and  its  speculative 
sides,  had  conquered  Christianity.  Practically  the 
Church  was  a  Platonic  republic,  and  not  a  kingdom 
of  God  ;  speculatively  she  was  far  more  Neoplatonic 
than  Christian,  even  after  she  had  arrayed  herself  in 
Aristotelianism.|  But  with  all  this  the  Church  was 
nourishing,  in  these  very  Hellenicisms,  the  germs  of  a 
reaction  against  herself  and  her  claims.  Mysticism  is 
of  necessity  an  individual  matter,  and  tends  to  make 
the  individual  independent  of  the  Church.     This  was 

*  "  Mysticism  is  catholic  piety  generally,  as  far  as  the  latter 
is  not  mere  obedience  to  the  Church — that  is,  implicit  faith. 
For  this  reason  mysticism  is  not  one  form  among  others  of  pre- 
Reformation  piety ;  .  .  .  but  it  is  the  catholic  pattern  of  indi- 
A'idual  piety  in  general." — Hamack,  Dogmengeschichte,  vol.  iii, 
p.  375.  "  A  mystic  who  does  not  become  a  catholic  is  a  dilet- 
tante."—J6i(7.,  p.  377. 

f  "  Do  thou,  0  friend,  proceeding  boldly  on  the  way  to  mystic 
visions,  abandon  the  senses  and  the  operations  of  the  intellect ; 
abandon  things  sensible  and  things  invisible,  and  all  non-being 
and  being  ;  and,  as  far  as  possible,  unknowingly  restore  thyself 
to  the  unity  of  Him  who  is  above  all  essence  and  all  science." 
Quoted  with  approval  by  Bonaventura  {Itinerarium  Mentis  in 
Beum,  chap,  vii),  from  Dionys.  Areopag.  (Mystic  Theol.,  chap, 
i,  sec.  1). 

X  The  mysticism  of  Thomas,  the  consummate  Aristotelian, 
is  quite  as  marked  as  that  of  his  more  Platonic  contemporary 
Bonaventura.  See  Thomas  a  Vallgornera,  0.  P.,  Mystica  Theo- 
logia  Divi  Thomce,  2  vols.,  8vo,  Turin,  1890-91. 


218       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

strikingly  illustrated  in  the  German  mysticism  of  the 
thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries — a  mysticism  which 
not  only  gave  birth  to  such  associations  as  the  Friends 
of  God  and  the  Brothers  of  Common  Life  (rendered 
forever  famous  by  Thomas  a  Kenjpis),  but  also,  in  a 
degree,  paved  the  way  for  Protestantism.*  Aristotelian 
scholasticism,  on  the  other  hand,  by  introducing  rea- 
son as  a  chief  architect  of  that  theology  which  was  to 
be  the  very  life-principle  and  sanction  of  the  Church, 
opened  the  way  for  the  triumph  of  rationalism.!  The 
results  of  all  this  were,  on  the  one  hand,  the  Pagan 
Renaissance,  which  aimed  at  Hellenicism,  pure  and 
simple ;  on  the  other,  the  Protestant  Eeformation, 
which  sought  to  extrude  Hellenicism,  and  pai^cu- 
larly  Aristotle,  from^ligion  and  the  Church,  ancfcjo 
return  to  pure  Christianity.  The  former  was  confin 
to  the  Romance  peoples,  the  latter  to  the  Germanic, 
between  whom  a  great  gulf  was  thus  fixed. | 

With  the  Pagan  Renaissance  and  the  Protestant 
Reformation  began  a  new  period  in  the  progress  of 
man  toward  that  moral  autonomy  which  was  formu- 
lated by  Socrates  and  translated  into  concrete  life  by 
Jesus.  Neither  of  these  movements  in  the  beginning 
understood  its  own  meaning,  and  they  had  little  in 
common    except   an   impulse   toward   freedom  —  the 

*  Luther's  sympath)^  for  the  German  mystics  is  well  known. 

f  See  Eucken,  Die^hiJos.  des  Thorn,  von  Aquino  und  die 
Cultur  der  Gegenwart,  pp.  24  sqq. 

X  The  great  epopoeia  of  this  double  reaction  is  Gothe's  Faust, 
in  which  the  nature  and  limitations  of  Hellenism  are  well 
brought  out,  but  in  which  the  meaning  of  Christianity  is  but 
poorly  appreciated.  Its  characteristic  features,  indeed,  are  com- 
pletely ignored.  Gothe's  sympathies  were  too  Hellenic,  Neo- 
platonic,  and  Pantheistic,  to  admit  of  any  other  result. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  219 

former  demanding  it  for  the  sensuous  and  aesthetic 
nature,  the  latter  for  the  intellect  and  the  will.  In  a 
way  they  supplemented  each  other — a  fact  which  Gothe 
observed  and  tried  to  bring  out  in  Faust.  Indeed,  it 
was  one  of  Gothe's  aims  to  bring  the  two  movements 
into  fruitful  connection.  The  effects  of  the  new  de- 
parture soon  showed  themselves  in  all  departments  of 
human  activity,  not  only  in  religion  but  also  in  art, 
science,  ethics,  politics,  education,  and  philosophy.  I 
can  not  follow  them  into  all  these  regions,  but  must 
content  myself  with  taking  a  glance  at  the  last  two,  in 
which  we  shall  see  clearly  how  completely  Hellenic  in 
its  motives  the  whole  movflnent  was. 

The  education  of  the  middle  age  had  consisted 
of  the  "  seven  liberal  arts,"  ^ilosophy  (physics, 
metaphysics,  ethics),  and  theology,  forming,  it  was 
thought,  a  natural  stair  from  Nature  up  to  God.* 
This  curriculum  was  of  Greek  origin,  but  modified  by 
Christian  ideals,  and  it  was  a  noble  one,  remarkable 
alike  for  its  comprehensiveness,  its  unity,  and  its  aim- 
fulness.  I/b  was  admirably  adapted  to  train  men  for 
membership  in  the  Churchi^and  to  make  them  loyal  to 
its  aims.^It  corresponded  to  a  perfectly  clear  and 
definite  view  of  life,  its  career  and  end,  such  as  the 
Church  held.  With  the  rise  of  the  new  movement, 
and  its  twofold  tendency,  this  definiteness  was  lost, 
and  consequently  education  became  in  a  measure 
chaotic,  fragmentary,  and  aimles^i— a  condition  from 
which  it  has  not  entirely  recovered  even  to  this  day.f 

*  See  my  Aristotle  and  the  Ancient  Educational  Ideals^  p. 
239  sqq. 

f  See  a  forcible  statement  of  this  fact,  Seeley,  Natural  Re- 
ligion, p.  128. 


220      EDUCATION  OP  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

Several  of  the  "  liberal  arts  "  were  discarded,  and  their 
place  taken  by  the  study  of  tlie  Greek  and  Latin  pagan 
writers.  But  there  was  no  uniformity  of  practice,  be- 
cause there  was  no  uniformity  of  aim.  At  first  sight 
this  seems  very  regrettable,  but  it  could  not  have  been 
otherwise.  If  men  were  to  attain  that  autonomy  which 
was  the  aim  of  the  new  epoch,  they  must  each  set  his 
own  aim  and  select  that  education  which  seemed  most 
likely  to  lead  him  to  it.  It  necessarily  took — let  us 
rather  say,  it  necessarily  will  take — a  long  time  for 
men  exercising  moral  freedom  to  recognize  that  that 
freedom  can  never  become  actual  and  concrete  until 
they  all  have  a  common  aim,  and  work  freely  and 
unitedly  toward  that.  Until  then  education  will  not 
attain  the  unity,  ctfciprehensiveness,  and  aimfulness 
which  it  had  in  the  middle  age. 

The  same  change  that  took  place  in  education  took 
place  in  philosophy.  Mediaeval  philosophy  had  had  a 
perfectly  definite  aim,  which  was,  to  act  as  a  handmaid 
to  theology,  and  show  that  the  facts  of  the  world  and 
of  life  were  in  perfect  harmony  with  revealed  truth. 
Credo  ut  intelligam :  first  faith,  and  then  philosophy 
to  justify  it.  Under  the  new  movement  all  was  differ- 
ent. The  Pagan  Renaissance  did  not  profess  to  know 
where  philosophy  might  lead,  and  so  contented  itself 
for  the  most  part  with  studying  Plato  and  Plotinus 
and  questioning  [N'ature,  thus  laying  the  foundations 
of  modern  science.  The  Protestant  Reformation,  on 
the  other  hand,  with  a  correct  instinct,  distrusted  phi- 
losophy as  a  means  of  reaching  divine  truth,  and  there- 
fore devoted  little  attention  to  it.  After  a  time,  how- 
ever, individuals  more  or  less  impregnated  with  the 
Protestant  spirit  engaged  in  free  speculation,  and  nat- 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  221 

urally  came  to  very  diverse  results/  Some,  like  the 
Oxford  Platonists,  turned  back  to  the  ancient  think- 
ers; but  the  majority  trusted  to  their  own  unaided 
intelligence.  If  Protestantism  looked  askance  at  Phi- 
losophy, Philosophy  responded  by  going  its  own  way 
independently  of  Protestantism.  In  one  respect  this 
was  a  great  advantage,  in  that  Philosophy  was  thus 
able  to  unfold  itself  independently  of  authority;  in 
another,  it  w^as  a  great  disadvantage,  in  that  it  fell  out 
of  relation  to  theology,  and  altogether  ignored  that 
sphere  of  experience  from  which  religion  draws  its 
life.  It  thus  remained,  and  remains,  essentially  at  the 
Hellenic  stage.  Of  the  two  most  fruitful  philosophies 
that  arose  under  Protestant  influence,  that  of  Des- 
cartes and  that  of  Locke,  the  former,  in  the  hands  of 
iWolf,  ended  in  pure  metaphysical  formalism  ;  the  lat- 
ter, in  those  of  Hume,  in  absolute  skepticism ;  and 
when  Kant  attempted  to  construct  a  philosophy  by 
uniting  the  two,  he  only  paved  the  way  for  Hegelian- 
ism  and  Schopenhauerianism,  the  former  of  which  is 
only  a  modernized  form  of  Neoplatonic  Gnosticism, 
while  the  latter  is  little  more  than  Orientalized  Stoi- 
cism. Both  may  now  be  said  to  be  obsolete,  and  the 
Protestant  world  to  be  without  a  philosophy.  The 
same  cause  which  led  to  the  decay  of  ancient  philoso- 
phy has  brought  about  that  of  modern  philosophy — 
the  neglect  of  the  supernatural  sense.  Ignore  this, 
and  philosophy  necessarily  ends  in  either  pure  for- 
malism, pure  skepticism,  pure  mysticism,  or  pure  pes- 
simism. 

Comparing  the  colossal  results  attained  by  medias- 
val  thought  with  the  meagre  and  uncertain  products 
of  modern  speculation,  we  can  hardly  help  feeling  as 


222      EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

the  Israelites  did  when  in  the  barren  wilderness  they 
sighed  for  the  fleshpots  of  Egypt.  But  it  may  be  well 
to  bear  in  mind  that  they  were  on  the  way  to  the  prom- 
ised land,  and  that  their  meagre  fare,  which  could  not 
be  kept  overnight,  was  after  all  from  heaven.  The 
promised  land  of  humanity  is  moral  freedom,  which 
implies  individual  insight  and  conviction,  and  tliose 
who  are  striving  after  these  and  refusing  to  accept  any 
truth  on  external  authority  are  on  the  way  thither,  no 
matter  what  sandy  tracks,  monsters,  and  hobgoblins 
they  may  have  to  encamp  among  overnight.  The 
truth  is,  the  chaotic  condition  in  which  all  the  depart- 
ments of  human  life  are  at  this  moment  need  cause  us 
neither  regret  nor  apprehension.  It  is  simply  the  first 
result  of  man's  attempt  to  live  a  free  moral  life,  to  di- 
rect his  steps  in  accordance  with  the  universal  element 
in  him ;  and  the  more  fearlessly  he  persists  in  this  at- 
tempt, the  more  will  the  harmonizing  and  unifying 
power  of  that  element  become  manifest  and  actual,  the 
more  will  universal  freedom  be  realized. 

In  our  endeavors  toward  this  we  shall  be  aided  in 
avoiding  rocks  and  pitfalls  by  a  careful  study  of  the 
career  of  Greek  education  and  culture,  whose  history, 
on  the  whole,  has  been  the  history  of  human  freedom. 
Let  us  take,  as  it  were,  a  bird's-eye  view  of  it,  marking 
its  chief  stages. 

Greek  education  and  culture  began  with  the  natural 
family  or  tribe,  which,  like  every  institution  of  culture, 
was  held  together  by  a  religious  bond.  In  this  instance 
the  bond  was  one  of  blood,  whose  corresponding  ritual 
was  a  meal  or  feast,  at  which  a  member  of  the  tribe,  an 
animal  or  a  man,  was  slain  and  its  flesh  partaken  of  by 
all  the  other  members,  a  portion  being  set  apart  for  the 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  223 

dead  members,  whose  shades  were  the  only  gods.  This 
was  the  stage  of  animism.  In  course  of  time,  as  the 
family  merged  in  the  phratry,  the  blood-bond  was 
supplemented  by  the  land-bond,  the  ancestor-gods  by 
Nature-gods,  and  the  sacrifice  by  the  offering.  This  is 
the  stage  of  natural  polytheism.  Later  still,  when  the 
phratry  was  subordinated  to  the  city-state,  the  older 
bonds  were  supplemented  by  a  worth-bond  (d/aeri}),  and 
a  line  was  drawn  between  gentle  and  simple.  The 
Nature- deities  were  now  superseded  by  moral  deities, 
and  prayer  was  added  to  sacrifice  and  offering.  This 
is  the  stage  of  moral  polytheism,  gradually  tending 
toward  monotheism,  which,  however,  it  never  reached 
among  the  Greeks  as  a  people. 

It  was  only  at  this  stage  that  a  distinction  began  to 
be  felt  between  the  natural  and  the  supernatural. 
Previously  the  supernatural  had  been  included  in  the 
natural.  All  things  were  full  of  gods,  as  Thales  said. 
But  now  the  distinction  obtruded  itself,  and  with  it 
the  distinction  between  the  natural  senses  and  the 
supernatural  sense,  and  henceforth  the  course  of  edu- 
cation was  determined  by  the  latter.  It  was  only  now, 
indeed,  that  conscious,  systematic  education,  such  as 
called  schools  into  existence,  could  begin.  For  a  time 
the  Greek  thinkers  made  an  effort  to  bring  the  object 
of  the  supernatural  sense  into  consciousness  and  to 
make  it  the  rule  of  life.  This  is  evident  in  the  writ- 
ings of  Pherecydes  and  the  other  theologians  (^eoXdyot), 
and  of  ^schylus.  But  after  a  time  attention  concen- 
trated itself  upon  the  natural,  and  gave  birth  to  phi- 
losophy instead  of  to  theology.  The  results  of  this 
were  strange  and  far-reaching.  Setting  out  with  nature 
alone,  and  working  by  purely  abstract  processes  up  from 
16 


224:       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

it,  the  Greeks  finally  arrived  at  a  supreme  principle 
which  was  merely  the  last  abstraction  of  reason.     This 
idol,  called  by  various  names — Reason,  Being,  Intellect, 
etc. — they  elevated  into  the  place  of  God,  and  from  it 
they  were  never  afterward  able  to  free   themselves. 
Their  God,  instead  of  being  the  concrete   object  of 
the  supernatural  sense,  remained  an  abstraction  from 
nature  to  the  very  last.  ^  This  is  the  weakness  of  Hel- 
lenism, and  the  reason  why  it  never  overcame  polythe- 
ism.   Socrates,  indeed,  in  whom  the  supernatural  sense 
was  strong,  made  an  effort  in  the  other  direction,  and 
.'  owed  in  his  life  and  in  his  death  the  moral  value  of 
that  sense ;  but  he  never  reached  clearness  with  regard 
to  the  supernatural,  and  he  had  no  successors.     Plato 
and  Aristotle  both  returned  to  the  abstract  God  of 
Nature,  and   thus  determined  the  whole   subsequent 
course  of  Greek  thought.     When  the  nation  rose  po- 
litically above  the  city-state,  and  needed  a  divinity  to 
be  the  soul  and  sanction  of  an  cecumenic  empire,  the 
Greek  consciousness  had  none  to  offer — nothing  but  a 
jale,  lifeless  abstraction.     Even  the  ideal  city-states  of 
li  ito  and  Aristotle  proved  utterly  incapable  of  realiza- 
tion, and  after  a  time  the  whole  of  Greece  became  a 
subject  province   of   a  foreign  empire,   thus  paying 
d<  arly  for  her  neglect  of  the  supernatural.     Doubtless 
r  philosophy  would  have  sunk  into  oblivion  before 
u3  religious  spirit,  had  it  not  allied  itself  with  sys- 
ns  of  thought  that  were  founded  upon  the  super- 
tural  sense.     Among  these  the  highest  and  purest 
.3   that  of   the  Jews,  whose   culmination  was  the 
iching   of  Jesus.      Allying  itself   with  pre-Chris- 
n    Judaism,    it    produced    Philonism  ;    crowning 
elf   with   the    gospel    of   Jesus,   it  gave   Catholic 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  225 

Christianity,  which  finally  became  the  religion  of  the 
(Decumenic  empire. 

This  gospel-crowned  Hellenism  might  have  been 
the  power  which  was  to  raise  mankind  to  that  moral 
autonomy  which  Socrates  had  promised  and  Jesus  ex- 
emplified, had  it  been  content  to  wear  its  crown  in 
meekness.  Instead  of  this,  however,  it  continually 
tried  to  rend  it,  or  cast  it  aside,  and  to  substitute  for 
it  the  Bacchic  wreath  of  abstract  naturalism.  Wear- 
ing this,  it  could  only  offer  external  discipline  for  in- 
ward freedom,  mysticism  for  piety,  and  asceticism  for 
moral  life.  Even  when,  with  the  aid  of  Aristotle,  it 
succeeded  in  calling  into  existence  an  institution  ani- 
mated by  its  own  spirit,  it  only  prepared  the  way  for 
its  own  repudiation  by  the  spirit  of  freedom.  This, 
by  raising  up  the  Pagan  Renaissance  and  the  Protest- 
ant Reformation,  started  a  new  movement,  in  which 
the  world  is  now  engaged,  and  which,  if  the  lessons  of 
past  history  be  only  heeded,  may  at  last  conduct  hu- 
manity to  the  promised  land  of  moral  freedom.  And 
these  lessons  are  not  difficult  to  enumerate.  The  first 
is,  that  reason,  abstracting  from  nature,  can  never,  apart 
from  the  object  of  the  supernatural  sense,  reach  a  first 
principle  that  will  give  effective  sanction  to  moral 
life,  or  form  the  basis  of  a  free  social  institution,  but 
only  a  moral  despotism,  expressing  itself  in  mysticism 
and  asceticism.  The  second  is,  that,  until  the  super- 
natural sense  can  recognize  in  its  object  a  living  God, 
or  Being  of  perfect  intelligence,  love,  and  will,  super- 
nally  correlated,  but  in  no  sense  identical,  with  the 
spirits  of  men,  so  that  His  perfections  are  their  goal, 
and  not  His  being  their  grave,  it  will  never  be  fully 
able  to  maintain  its  throne  against  the  claims  of  the 


226       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK  PEOPLE. 

abstracting  reason,*  or  supply  the  basis  of  moral  life. 
This  was  strikingly  illustrated  in  the  case  of  Kant, 
whose  supernatural  sense,  which  he  termed,  strangely 
enough,  the  "practical  reason,"  yielded  him  only  a 
"categorical  imperative,"  the  conditions  of  which — 
God,  freedom,  immortality — his  "  pure  reason  "  could 
only  postulate,  but  never  know  as  really  existing.  Such 
an  imperative — a  law  without  lawgiver,  meaning,  or 
sanction — could  of  course  have  neither  moral  nor  or- 
ganizing power.  The  third  lesson  is,  that,  while  the 
hypostases  reached  through  the  supernatural  sense 
must  be  carefully  connected  and  correlated  with  the 
abstract  laws  reached  through  the  natural  senses,  the 
two  orders  of  results  must  be  held  strictly  distinct. 
Infinite  harm  has  come  from  neglecting  this  lesson. 
On  the  one  hand,  science,  which  is  the  system  of 
laws  abstracted  from  the  data  of  the  natural  senses, 
has  been  called  upon  to  demonstrate  the  existence  of 
God  and  the  authority  of  the  moral  law ;  on  the  other, 
theology,  which  is  the  system  of  the  hypostases  reached 

*  Although  it  is  reason  that  interprets  the  data  of  the  super- 
natural sense,  as  well  as  those  of  the  natural  senses,  it  acts  dif- 
ferently in  the  two  cases.  In  dealing  with  the  latter,  it  abstracts 
and  generalizes ;  in  dealing  with  the  former,  it  concretes  and  in- 
dividualizes— in  a  word,  hypostasizes — and  the  one  process  is  as 
legitimate  as  the  other.  One  defect  of  Hellenism  was  that  it 
failed  to  recognize  the  nature  and  legitimacy  of  the  latter  pro- 
cess. It  was,  indeed,  ready  enough  to  turn  an  adjective — good, 
intelligent,  or  the  like— into  a  noun ;  but  such  a  noun  is  not  a 
hypostasis.  The  same  is  true  of  Hegelianism,  which  tries  to  find 
a  supreme  principle  not  in  one  abstraction  of  the  reason,  as 
Hellenism  did,  but  in  the  organized  sum  of  all  of  them.  It  was 
therefore  perfectly  consistent  in  placing  philosophy  above  re- 
ligion, as  all  true  Greek  thought  had  done  before  it. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  227 

tlirough  the  supernatural  sense,  has  been  looked  to  for 
an  explanation  of  the  natural  world.  Laplace  has  been 
blamed  for  not  employing  the  "  hypothesis  "  of  God  in 
his  Mecmiique  Celeste^  and  Jesus  for  not  expounding 
the  Copernican  theory  of  astronomy.*  In  this  way 
science  and  religion  have  both  been  discredited,  and 
enmity  has  been  stirred  up  between  them,  so  that  sci- 
ence has  often  become  faithless,  and  religion  ignorant 
and  prejudiced.  The  future  of  both  depends  largely 
upon  the  removal  of  this  enmity. 

Finally,  the  fourth  lesson  of  history  is,  that,  of  all 
the  faculties  of  the  human  soul,  that  which  demands 
the  most   careful  training  is  the  supernatural  sense. 


*  "  The  fundamental  prejudice  of  scholasticism — shared,  in- 
deed, by  ancient  and,  alas !  by  modern  theology — was,  that  the- 
ology is  natural  science  {WelterTcennen),  or  at  least  is  bound  to 
ground  and  complete  such  science.  At  the  present  day,  when 
we  say  that  it  is  bound  to  help  out,  to  step  in  where  science  fails, 
we  are  trying,  with  forced  modesty,  to  say  the  same  thing." — 
Harnack,  Dogmengeficliiclite,  vol.  iii,  p.  313,  note.  *•  The  true 
relation  (of  the  Church  to  science)  does  not  consist  in  her  always 
adopting  the  most  recent  theories,  but  in  rendering  herself  inde- 
pendent of  scientific  and  philosophic  theories  altogether.  '  What 
I  offer,'  she  must  say,  *  remains  true,  whether  Copernicus  or  Ptol- 
emy, whether  Darwin  or  Agassiz,  is  right.  The  gospel  neither 
is,  nor  has,  any  system  of  cosmology  or  biology :  it  is  the  an- 
nouncement of  the  kingdom  of  God,  which  is  seeking  to  realize 
itself  in  the  hearts  (Gemuth)  and  lives  of  men.  It  does  not  seek 
support  in  inexplicable  natural  occurrences  and  miracles,  but 
upon  experiences  of  the  heart,  which  finds  peace  and  blessedness 
in  it.' " — Paulsen,  Einleitung  in  die  Philosophie  (1892),  p.  165. 
I  quote  these  passages  to  show  that  the  true  relation  between 
the  natural  and  supernatural  is  becoming  clear  to  modern 
thinkers.  The  second,  however,  is  from  a  work  which  is  a 
warning  example  of  what  an  earnest  thinker  may  come  to  who 


228       EDUCATION  OF  THE  GREEK   PEOPLE. 

While  it  remains  undeveloped  all  other  education  leads 
ultimately  to  nothing.  It  was  the  failure  to  recognize 
this  that  made  Greek  education  impotent  to  save  the 
world,  and  forced  it  to  crown  itself  with  Christianity, 
whose  function  it  is  to  train  the  supernatural  sense  to  a 
recognition  of  the  living  God  as  the  Father  of  Spirits, 
the  sanction  of  the  moral  law,  and  the  bond  of  institu- 
tional life. 

If,  now,  reverting  to  our  first  chapter  and  the  out- 
line of  a  complete  educatipn  there  attempted,  we  com- 
pare Greek  education  in  its  system  and  results  with 
that  outline,  we  s&all  be  able  to  form  some  estimate  of 
its  merits  and  defects.  The  first,  it  will  be  seen,  are 
very  numerous.  Greek  education  did  at  every  period 
of  its  career  seek  with  all  the  means  in  its  power,  by  a 
graded  process  of  rational  discipline,  to  lift  men  out  of 
the  bonds  ^f  animal  necessity  into  moral  freedom  as 
the  Greeks  conceived  it.-v  It  was  at  all  times  marked 
by  unity,  comprehensiveness,  and  aimfulness.  It  left 
no  part  of  man's  nature,  known  as  such,  uncared  for. 
And  so  successful  was  it,  so  much,  did  it  transmute 
and  elevate  human  nature,  that  to  the  Greeks  is  justly 
accorded  the  honor  of  having  discovered  the  principle 
of  human  freedom,  and  of  having  placed  the  sword  of 
victory  in  the  hands  of  Reason.  They  not  only  lifted 
the  world  out  of  barbarism,  but  it  requires  their  influ- 
ence even  to  this  day  to  prevent  it  from  falling  back 
into  the  same.     Even  Christianity  itself  has  sunk  into 

does  not  know  the  nature  of  the  supernatural  faculty,  but  con- 
founds it  (as  Tennyson  does,  see  In  Memoriam,  cxxiv,  4)  with 
the  heart.  Paulsen  arrives  at  pure  pantheism,  and  Tennyson 
came  perilously  near  the  same.  Of  modern  thinkers,  Spicker 
(see  p.  138)  comes  nearest  the  truth. 


IN  CONTACT  WITH  THE  WESTERN  WORLD.  2^19 

barbarism  and  superstition  wherever  it  has  withdrawn 
itself  from  Greek  influence.*  So  much  for  the  merits 
/of  Greek  education.  Its  defects  are  all  summed  up  in 
one.  by  substituting  philosophy  for  religion  ^  %;  cul- 
tivating unduly  the  abstract  reason, ^lich  is  the  organ 
of  the  former,  and  ignoring  the  supernatural  sense, 
which  is  the  condition  of  the  latter ;  (by  placing  the 
supreme  activity  of  man  in  intellectual  vision;  instead 
of  in  moral  life  guided  by  vision,  love,  and  a  good  will, 
it  failed  to  put  itself  in  living  relation  to  the  supreme 
principle  of  that  moral  freedom  which  is  the  "  chief 
end  of  man."  In  consequence,  Greece  not  only  per- 
ished herself,  but  she  left  an  example  by  following 
which  other  nations  have  perished — yea,  and  other 
nations  will  yet  perish,  unless,  warned  by  her  fate,  they 
make  all  education  culminate  in  the  culture  of  the 
spiritual  sense  which  reveals  God,  and  so  place  religion 
on  the  throne  that  belongs  to  her  as  the  guide  and  in- 
spiration of  life.  Thus,  as  Christianity  without  Hel- 
lenism sinks  into  barbarism,  so  Hellenism  without 
C*hristianity  leads  to  destruction.  Only  when  united, 
as  humanity  and  divinity,  do  they  lead  to  life  and 
freedom. 

*  Speaking  of  the  decay  of  the  Eastern  churches  that  sepa- 
rated from  Catholicism,  D.  K.  Mliller  says,  "  This  result  may 
enable  us  to  estimate  what  the  fact  of  the  Hellenization  of 
Ciiristianity  during  the  first  centuries  meant — its  rescue  from 
hdYbarism^—Kirchengeschichte,  vol.  i,  p.  281. 


THE  END. 


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